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MARY'S ALABASTER BOX. 



BY 



HENRY MELVILLE KING, 

PASTOR OF THE EMMANUEL BAPTIST CHURCH, 
ALBANY, N. Y. 



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BOSTON 
HOWARD GANNETT, 

TREMONT TEMPLE, 
l88 3 . 




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Copyright, 1883, 
By Howard Gannett, 



C. M. A. Twitchell & Co., 43 Kilby Street, 
PRINTERS. 






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The old friends in the Dudley-Street Church, 
who for nearly nineteen years listened patiently 
and lovingly to the words of my mouth, and to 
the new friends in the Emmanuel Church, 
whose earnest attention is a fresh inspiration 
from Sunday to Sunday, these words from my 
pen are affectionately 

DEDICATED. 



PREFATORY. 



The contents of this volume have, for the most part, 
appeared in the religious press. The larger part of the 
chapters have been published as articles in The Stew- 
ard of Chicago. Some of them have been published in 
The Ziori s Advocate of Portland ; others in The Religons 
Herald 'of Richmond, and in the The Criterion of Albany. 
They are now collected in a more permanent form with 
the hope that they may be spiritually helpful in hours 
of meditation, strengthening Christian faith and quick- 
ening the religious life. 

The title of the first chapter has been given to the 
book for two reasons : first, because every book must 
have a tittle ; and second, because this little volume, 
though it does not presume to think itself " ointment of 
spikenard very precious," would pour all its fragrance 
on the feet of him " whom having not seen, we love ; 
in whom, though now we see him not, yet believing, we 
rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory." 



CONTENTS. 



Chapter. Page. 

I. MARY'S ALABASTER BOX, 7 

II. MY CHURCH MEMBER, ...... . 15 

III. THE INCARNATION, 19 

IV. A STUDY OF JOHN THE BAPTIST, ... 27 
V. THE INCREASING CHRIST, and 

THE DECREASING SELF, 33 

VI. HONEST DOUBT, 43 

VII. THE OPEN DOOR, 49 

VIII. CHRISTIAN SOBERNESS, 57 

IX. RELIGIOUS LIBERTY AND ITS ABUSES, 61 

X. SPIRITUAL LIBERTY, 65 

XI. A LETTER TO A STUDENT, 71 



CONTENTS. Continued. 

Chapter. Page. 

XII. CHRIST OUR PASCHAL LAMB, 75 

XIII. THE CONDITION OF FORGIVENESS, . . 79 

XIV. THE HOMESICK GERMAN, 85 

XV. THE LOST JESUS, 91 

XVI. MY FATHER'S BUSINESS, 97 

XVII. JUSTICE AND MERCY, 103 

XVIII. ONE LESSON OF PENTECOST, 107 

XIX. HOLINESS, NOT HAPPINESS, ..... 113 

XX. WHY BECOME CHRISTIANS? 119 

XXI. GOD'S DELAY, 123 

XXII. WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST 7 .... 127 

XXIII. CHRIST THE REVEALER, 133 

XXIV. THE RELIGION OF THE FUTURE, Part I. 141 
XXV. THE RELIGION OF THE FUTURE, Part IL 149 



I. MARY'S ALABASTER BOX. 



MARY'S ALABASTER BOX. 

There was no more beautiful incident in the life of 
our Saviour than his anointing in the house of Simon, 
the leper. It was Mary who brought and broke the 
precious alabaster box. The disciples indignantly re- 
proved ; but Jesus lovingly approved, and embalmed 
the name of Mary and the memory of her beautiful 
deed in the amber of the everlasting gospel, and spread 
the fragrance of the act not only through that little 
Judean home, but through all lands and all homes to the 
latest time. It was a momentary act, but it should be 
held in perpetual remembrance. It was the sudden 
impulse of a loving heart, but Christ endowed it with 
immortality. 

What gave to this act of Mary its immortal worth, 
and secured for it such recognition and commendation ? 

First, it was done unto Christ. How much Jesus 
may have meant by the words, " She did it for my 
burial,'' whether Mary's " insight of love " was a kind 
of prophetic foresight and she acted with some con- 
scious foreshadowing of his appproaching death and 
burial, or whether she was an unconscious prophetess 
and Christ saw in her act a beautiful meaning unknown 



8 Marys Alabaster Box. 

to her, we may not be able to determine. But this we 
do know, the act was done directly unto Christ. It 
was his head and his feet that she anointed. It was 
an expression of her ardent love to him whom she 
accepted as the promised Messiah, and her soul's Re- 
deemer. She had before her the visible object of her 
heart's adoration, and on his not unwilling person she 
lavished the wealth of her offering. As Christ said, 
" She hath wrought a good work upon me" " She did it 
for me, for my burial" 

There is a great deal of so-called charity in the 
world, which has no Christ in it. It is not done unto 
him. It may be done from a love of personal honor, or 
from humane motives, sympathy with suffering, a yield- 
ing to the better instincts of our common nature. But 
it is not charity of the highest order. It lacks one ele- 
ment of immortality. It has in it no thought of Christ. 
It is not done out of love to Christ. It is not done 
with a conscious desire to be like Christ. Men may 
erect memorials of it in stone, or bronze, or eloquent 
speech ; but it has never been laid on Christ's altar, as 
the offering of a grateful soul to him ; it has never 
been sanctified by a Christian faith ; it has never been 
made immortal by Christ's acceptance and benediction. 

We cannot now have the visible person of the Saviour 
with us, on whose head we may pour our offerings, at 
whose feet we may lay our service. Yet it is possible 



Marys Alabaster Box. g 

for us even now so to have Christ before us in all our 
thoughts, and his love so diffused in our hearts that our 
charities, our services, our lives may be as a costly and 
acceptable offering unto him. Christ has taught us the 
blessed possibility of living now directly and constant- 
ly unto him, of seeing him in every benevolent cause, 
and his lineaments in the face of every sorrowing a'hd 
needy suppliant, and of hearing in the evils and 
miseries which afflict the human family the tender tones 
of his own pleading voice. Did he not say, " Whoso- 
ever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a 
cup of cold water only, in the name of a disciple, 
verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise lose his re- 
ward ? " Or, as Mark puts it, still more strikingly, 
" Whosoever shall give you a cup of water to drink in 
my name, because ye belong to Christ, verily I say 
unto you, he shall not lose his reward." In like man- 
ner, in the graphic picture of the final judgment, we 
are taught that Christ so identifies himself now with 
every humble disciple that whatsoever is done unto 
them is done unto him, and that even the eternal 
awards are to be thus determined. 

What a vast difference it would make in the service 
which we render, its nature and amount, and in the 
lives which we live, their quality and their usefulness, 
if we could always remember that Christ may still be 
the direct object of affection, and thought, and effort ; 



io Marys Alabaster Box. 

that what we do we are to do unto him, and that only 
such service and such living have any gracious acknowl- 
edgment by him, or any promise or hope of immortal 
remembrance. 

The peculiar worth and virtue of Mary's act con- 
sisted, secondly, in the fact that it was done regardless 
of expense and undoubtly at great self-denial. The 
ointment, very precious, had a money value of many 
pounds. It cost the earnings of a mechanic, in those 
days, for a whole year. Mary might have been long in 
accumulating so large a sum. Yet to her it had no 
other value than this, that she could give it to Christ. 
And so she poured it without stint, entirely, " waste- 
fully," the indignant disciples, headed by the wicked 
Judas, said, upon the head of Jesus. If she had used 
a little on Christ, and preserved the large remainder 
for her own use, it might have occasioned no remark. 
If she had kept it all for herself, none of them might 
have once thought that she was withholding anything 
from the poor. But it was when Mary broke and 
emptied the box on the dear head of her Saviour, that 
the cost seemed so great and the expenditure ex- 
travagant, and the duty of economy and of benevolence, 
and the needs of the poor, seemed matters of such vast 
importance in the eyes of all. 

But Mary's generosity, like her love, was without 
stint. It stopped not to reckon money values or to 



Mary s Alabaster Box. 1 1 

think of the cost of its offering. If it had, it would 
have said, it is all too little. It had its treasured box, 
and it thought — this is my opportunity. It could 
spare it, because it would spare it. It forgot the value 
of its gift in the joy of making it, and undoubtedly 
was surprised when it was reminded how much it cost. 
And so, generously, self-forgettingly, lovingly it poured 
out its offering, adding to its delicious fragrance the 
diviner fragrance of its own spirit. 

Does Mary's conduct, by its contrast and unlikeness, 
remind us of our own ? How we lavish our days and 
years upon the world, its cares and pleasures, and think 
nothing of it, if only we are successful in what we seek ! 
But we count the hours carefully, and even the mo- 
ments, which we give to God and his service, and 
reckon them at their highest market value, never for- 
getting to put them down on the debit side of our 
account with God. We pour out our pounds wastefully 
on the altar of selfishness and luxury, and then split 
our pennies when we make an offering to Christ. Oh, 
for a love like Mary's in all of our hearts, which will 
make us extravagant in our devotion to our divine 
Master, and entirely forgetful of the cost of what we 
do, if Jesus will only give us an opportunity to serve 
him, and own and bless the service which we render. 

Once more : the peculiar excellence of Mary's act 
consisted also in this : that it was done regardless of 



12 Mary s Alabaster Box. 

the approval or disapproval of men. Mary evidently 
did not stop to think how the others would view what 
she was about to do. If she had, with a love so strong 
as hers, it would have made no difference. Should 
they approve, well and good. Should they disapprove, 
no matter. Her love demanded expression, some vis- 
ible form and body, some mould into which its moulten 
stream could run, some channel in which its pure 
waters could flow, and it would have required more 
than the fear of adverse criticism, and more than open 
objection and opposition to deter her from the execu- 
cution of her purpose. The frowns which gathered on 
all faces, the lips which uttered their words of con- 
demnation, had no effect upon her loving and resolute 
heart. She went right on till the service was done, 
and she had gently anointed his head and then his feet, 
and wiped them with her flowing locks. Then, when 
she had completed her holy and significant service, un- 
moved by the disapprobation of all the others, she 
looked up into the face of her approving Lord and 
heard his sweet words of unexpected commendation, 
and her happy heart was more than satisfied. 

Oh, followers of the same Jesus ! is not this the 
reason why we are so often deterred from some known 
duty, from some inviting service for Christ, from the 
execution of some good purpose formed, it may be, in 
prayer, because our love is not so deep, so full, so 



Ma?ys Alabaster Box. 13 

strong that it must have expression ? We take counsel 
with our fears. We purchase the alabaster box, it may 
be, but we dare not break it. We are intimidated by 
the thought of unfriendly criticism, and care more to 
avoid the disapproval of men than to win the approval 
of God and of conscience. 

Oh, for a love to Christ whose current shall be so 
deep and strong that it will sweep away all barriers, 
and flow on and on in the open channel of a noble 
service for Christ and our fellowmen, a love that will 
demand expression, that will seek it and find it in ways 
which may sometimes startle a cold and calculating 
prudence, and put to shame a lifeless indifference, and 
which, like Mary's, will live in the sunshine of Christ's 
commendation, and make its influence felt when these 
hearts have ceased to beat and these hands are folded 
to their long rest ! Such a love is possible for us all. It 
will transfigure the life which we live. It will fill with 
its fragrance, like Mary's precious spikenard, the home 
which we occupy, the sphere in which we move, and all 
our life in the church and in the world, and ascending 
to heaven like sweet incense, it will find acceptance 
there, and become, it may be, an everlasting memorial 
of the soul. 



II. MY CHURCH MEMBER. 



II. 
MY CHURCH-MEMBER. 

You may not know her name, but God knows it, and 
that is enough. Just as the November sun was sinking 
below the horizon her weary spirit took its upward 
flight to the home and the bosom of God. But the 
glory of the setting sun was pale and weak in com- 
parison with the glory of that life which then came to 
its earthly end. For more than half a century she had 
been a faithful and devoted member of the church. 
For four score years and five God spared her to know 
and do his will ; and, when her work of patience and 
labor of love was done, and she had ripened under 
life's discipline and fulfilled all her stewardship, God 
took her to himself and to her rest and reward. 

She was one of the old-time Christians, whose life 
was spent in living near to God, who had many and 
frequent hours of communion with him, to whom her 
vows of consecration were sacred things to be often 
solemnly renewed, and who longed from day to day for 
greater spirituality of mind and for a deeper conscious- 
ness of God's love and grace to her. Among her pri- 
vate papers was found the long-kept diary of her relig- 
ious exercises, which revealed unwonted breathings 
after an ascending, a more heavenly life. She lived 



1 6 My Church-Member. 

among us a life quiet, affectionate, happy, useful (God 
only knows how useful), caring most of all for the 
friendship of Christ and his people, with whom was all 
her delight. Owing to great bodily suffering and con- 
sequent mental weakness, she had not that triumphant 
departure from earth which she had anticipated. But 
the Saviour was still her trust and refuge. She feared 
no evil, for he was with her ; his rod and staff they com- 
forted her. Only a few hours before her spirit found 
its happy release, though her mind was wandering 
about other things, it fastened on that beautiful hymn 
expressive of her Christian faith — 
" Jesus, lover of my soul, 
Let me to thy bosom fly " — 

and her feeble lips repeated it, verse after verse, with- 
out hesitation or aid. The hymn has been clothed with 
a new sacredness to me, because it was associated with 
my parting hour with this aged saint. 

But she was best known and will be longest remem- 
bered because of her generous contributions to the 
church and objects of Christian benevolence. Being 
possessed of an income, not over large, she lived 
quietly, economically and self-denyingly, that she might 
have more to lay upon the altar of Christ. We were 
often deceived as to the amount of her income by the 
largeness and munificence of her charities. She looked 
upon herself as God's steward, and cheerfully sought 



My Church-Member. l 7 

to be faithful to her trust. Her charity money, which 
was in reality no small part of her income, was lovingly 
set apart and lovingly given, and she had no greater 
joy than this, that God had bestowed upon her the 
ability to help the poor and needy, and to aid in ad- 
vancing his kingdom in the world. What she gave 
she gave as to the Lord and not to men. She saw his 
loving face in every needy object, and heard his loving 
voice in every pleading appeal, so that her charity was 
not partial, and did not flow in any single channel. It 
was responsive to all need, and wide as the world. The 
church of Christ, which she loved, human suffering in 
every form, the cause of ministerial education, of tract 
distribution, of home missions, and especially of foreign 
missions, were all made to rejoice in her practical sym- 
pathy and frequent remembrance. The church, the 
community, the whole country, the whole world was 
filled with the fragrance of her loving deeds. 

Moreover, she thought not of the value of what she 
gave. Its only value to her was that Christ would 
accept it and use it for his glory. When a great con- 
flagration had consumed much of her income, she ex- 
pressed but one regret, namely, that her ability to do 
good was greatly lessened. But she planned to live a 
little closer, and to curtail her personal wants, that 
thereby she might lengthen out her contributions. 
Surely the poor made happy by her thoughtful charity, 



1 8 My Church-Member. 

many a needy minister and feeble church aided by her 
timely benevolence, the distant heathen to whom she 
sent the saving power of the Gospel, though her name 
was unheard and unknown among them, all will rise up 
to call her blessed. " Blessed are the dead who die in 
the Lord, that they may rest from their labors, and 
their works do follow them." 

In her death the cause of Christ lost a generous con- 
tributor, the poor a sympathizing helper, spiritual 
religion a shining example, and her church a loving 
and faithful member, for her prayers and her contribu- 
tions were wrought into its history and its prosperity. 
So long as the walls of that church remain standing, so 
long as that church as a spiritual body has an exist- 
ence on the earth, " this that this woman hath done 
shall be told as a memorial of her." I thank God that 
she was my church-member, for my heart is made glad 
at every remembrance of her. She seemed a modern 
Mary. She loved to sit at the feet of Jesus and learn 
of him, and she broke many an alabaster box of pre- 
cious nard, if not for the anointing, for the crowning of 
the head of her exalted Saviour. 



III. THE INCARNATION. 



III. 
THE INCARNATION. 

The birth of Jesus was no ordinary event. Unlike 
all other births, it was the beginning of a life that was 
unlike all other lives. That this birth should be singled 
out among so many millions to be commemorated in 
all lands, and through all ages, makes it easy for us to 
believe that there was something miraculous about it. 

i. The miracle of the incarnation is the most readily 
accepted of all the miracles of the Bible. Men may 
hesitate about accepting the miracle of the multiplica- 
tion of the loaves and fishes, and may stumble at the 
raising of the dead and at the resurrection of Christ 
himself, and yet cheerfully accept the wonderful and 
beautiful story of the birth of the Christ-child. This 
seems to commend itself to the religious instincts or 
the deepest wishes of men. It is an interesting fact 
that the doctrine of a divine incarnation has been the 
common teaching of the great religions of the world. 
Mr. Edwin Arnold finds in the religion of Guatama, 
which is the accepted religion of one-third of the 
human family, the doctrine of 

" A holy child 
Of wondrous wisdom, profiting all flesh, 



20 The Incarnation. 



Who shall deliver men from ignorance, 
Or rule the world, if he will deign to rule." 

Whether it be the sense of the divine still remaining 
in man which makes it easy for him to believe in a 
complete incarnation, or a sense of need in man 
which makes him long for a full manifestation of God 
among men in proffered sympathy, wisdom and power, 
we may not tell. But the fact is apparent that the 
doctrine of the incarnation is the most widely accepted 
and the most welcome of all religious truths. Men do 
not turn from it in defiant unbelief. At its threshold 
skepticism often stays its rash feet, and leaves un- 
assailed this wonderful desire of all nations, this 
beautiful hope of the human heart. Men seem ready 
to welcome the Christmas festival, and give to it some- 
thing of its spiritual significance, as celebrating the 
marvellous birth of a marvellous babe into this world of 
ours. And yet, the miracle of the incarnation, when 
rightly apprehended, is one of the most stupendous of 
all miracles. I doubt whether there is another wonder 
from the creation of the world to the resurrection of 
Christ, that is grander or more sublime than this. Is 
it not the wonder of all wonders ? Is it incredible that 
angels should announce it ? Is not the whole marvel- 
lous environment of the incarnation in keeping with so 
great an event ? And so it happens that the greatest 



The Incarnation. 2 * 



miracle in the world's history is the most widely- 
accepted of all, and finds annual recognition in the 
Christmas observance of men. 

2. The miracle of the incarnation carries with" it the 
credibility of the other miraculous displays of power 
which the gospels contain. A man who believes in the 
supernatural birth of Christ ought not to find it difficult 
to accept the inspired record of other miracles. This 
greatest exhibition of the miraculous being accepted, 
all that follows will be found to be in keeping with it. 
This is the introduction which gives character to the 
whole. A supernatural birth will be followed, we 
should expect, by a supernatural life. A child whose 
birth is such a marvel will be a marvel at whatever 
time you meet him, and from whatever point you view 
him. A dispensation whose opening act is so above 
the ordinary course of things, will be likely to move on 
in that higher and supernatural plane. Things which 
would be unnatural to us, and at this time, would be 
perfectly natural to Christ and to the circumstances of 
his life. Let it be granted that Christmas means some- 
thing, that it is observed in commemoration of the 
birth of a divine child, and you will not be surprised 
when you find in his life the evident tokens of his 
divinity ; indeed, you will be surprised if you do not 
find them there. All subsequent miracles which he 
wrought fall into line with the miracle of his birth. 



22 The Incarnation. 



One of the most impressive things about the life of 
Christ was its wonderful unity and consistency. There 
was nothing in it discordant or out of harmony. The 
key-note was given at his birth, and all the song that 
followed was in happy and unbroken accord. Dr. 
Bushnell has said of this " Being who has broken into 
this world and is not of it," that, "being a miracle 
himself, it would be the greatest of all miracles if he 
did not work miracles." And Dr. Schaff has said, in 
language strikingly similar, "He is the great central 
miracle of the whole gospel history. All his miracles 
are but the natural and necessary manifestations of his 
miraculous person, and hence they were performed with 
the same ease with which we perform our ordinary daily 
works. In the gospel of St. John they are simply and 
justly called his ' works.' It would be the greatest 
miracle, indeed, if he who is a miracle himself should 
have performed no miracles." 

3. The miracle of the incarnation carries with it the 
credibility of all the truths of the gospel. It is difficult 
to separate the teachings of Christ from his works. He 
taught by his works as well as by his words, and many 
of his most sublime truths are crystallized around the 
miracles which he wrought, and inseparably connected 
with them. All of his miracles were in some sense his 
divine credentials, disclosing to men his true character 
and his holy mission, as when he said, at the healing of 



The Incarnation. 23 



the palsied man, " that ye may know that the Son of 
Man hath power on earth to forgive sins ; " in other 
words, that ye may know who I am and what I came 
to do on earth, I say to this sick man, "Arise, take up 
thy bed and walk." But there is no miracle that more 
clearly establishes Christ's claim to be " a Teacher sent 
from God " than the miracle of the incarnation, which 
bears testimony to his divine origin and Sonship, and 
proclaims him to be the very light of the world. To 
accept the incarnation in all its spiritual significance is 
to acknowledge the kingly power of Christ's words, is 
to accept the truth of his teachings as to man, his 
nature, his danger, and his destiny, as to himself, his 
character, and his mission, and as to this life and the 
life to come, is to bow down to the supreme authority 
of Christ as the one great Teacher of the ages in the 
realms of morals and of spirit, and confess him, in the 
words of his own high claim, as " the way, the truth, 
and the life " for the world. The child of such a birth 
will be presumably free from all error, guilty of no 
falsehood or deception, the bearer of some heavenly 
revelation, the true Prophet of God's will to men, 
among whom he is to rule by the might of omnipo- 
tent and eternal truth. To observe Christmas and feel 
not the power of Christ's word in the soul, and bow 
not to the supremacy of his saving truth, is to be guilty 
of the gravest inconsistency and folly. " To this end 



24 The Incarnation. 



was I born," said Christ to Pilate, "and for this cause 
came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto 
the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth my 
voice." Unless the truth as it is in Jesus has brought us 
under its blessed dominion, and we have become its 
loving and obedient disciples, the Babe of Bethlehem 
was born in vain, and his mission for us is not yet 
fulfilled. 

4. Once more : the miracle of the incarnation estab- 
lishes the important fact that you and I have a Saviour, 
earth-born and heaven-born, Son of Mary and Son of 
God, all-merciful and almighty. It was no common male- 
factor whom those old Jews bore away to the cursed 
cross and put to death. It was no friendless, unknown 
criminal who was there left to suffer and die. Earth and 
heaven had echoed w r ith his name, and the long ages 
had been filled with the promise of his coming. I hear 
his name whispered by God in the garden in that first 
word of hope to our sinning parents. I see it written 
in type and symbol and bleeding sacrifice of God's 
ancient people. I find it inscribed on prophecy and 
psalm, to be read and sung in the public service of the 
temple, and in quiet hours of communion with God. I 
catch its echo as it is borne over the earth's surface 
and up to heaven on the wail of human needs and sor- 
rows and sins, generation after generation, as it passes 



The Incarnation. 2 S 



on, uttering its mournful cry, " Oh, that I knew where 
I might find him ! " Until at last in the fullness of 
time, angelic choirs accompanying him to the very 
threshold of his earthly mission, announce the advent 
of this new-born Prince and Saviour, and into the home 
of Mary there comes the foretold glory of his people, 
Israel, and the light whose rays should stream out over 
the Gentile world. 

In the miracle of Christ's birth, then, which wedded 
heaven and earth in a closer fellowship than had existed 
since man's fall, I behold the pledge of heaven's sym- 
pathy to earth's sad and bereaved ones, the pledge of 
heaven's help to earth's weak and tempted ones, and 
the pledge of heaven's forgiveness to earth's sinning 
and penitent ones. The heart of that Son holds in its 
strong embrace not only Mary, but all the mothers and 
all the sons of men. Those soft feet have walked the 
earth with the tread of a mighty conqueror. Those 
sweet lips have spoken the word of life to the world's 
sleeping millions. Those tiny hands have broken off 
the strong shackles of sin, and battered down the 
stony gates of death and the grave. Because the 
manger contained the divine Christ-child, the cross 
sustained the Prince of Peace, and by its mighty 
attraction and its healing virtue it has become the power 
of God unto salvation to the nations of a lost world. 



26 



The Incarnation. 



" Uplift his cross, the idols fall ; 

Descends the dove, the eagles fly ; 
Another Caesar sounds his call 

To men and nations far and nigh, 
Proclaiming David's son divine : 
Christ reigns upon the Palatine. 

Hail, Prince of Peace ! hail, King of Kings ! 

Who would not hail thy day of birth, 
Sunshine with healing in his wings, 

Light, love and joy to all the earth ! 
Once more let all men be enrolled, 
Thou the One Shepherd — in one fold." 




IV. A STUDY OF JOHN THE BAPTIST. 



IV. 

A STUDY OF JOHN THE BAPTIST. 

The significant reply of John the Baptist was " He 
must increase, but I must decrease." John's moon 
was in its wane. Christ's was the crescent moon, 
which should fill out to its full-orbed beauty, and wane 
no more. It has been remarked, by way of illustra- 
tion, that John the Baptist's day in the calendar is the 
longest day in the year, the 24th of June, and from 
that time the days begin to shorten ; while Christmas 
day, on which is celebrated the birth of our Saviour, is 
one of the shortest days in the year, and from it the 
days grow longer. 

John ever looked upon himself as simply a fore- 
runner, a prophet in advance, to prepare the way for a 
Greater who was to come. He said of himself, " I am the 
voice of one crying in the wilderness — make straight 
the way of the Lord." And when the multitude flocked 
unto him to receive baptism at his hands, aroused by 
his earnest words, and ready to declare themselves his 
followers, he impressed upon them the fact that his 
work was only preparatory, and pointed them away 
from himself to the coming One, saying : " I indeed 
baptize you with water unto repentance ; but he that 



28 A Study of John the Baptist 

cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am 
not worthy to bear ; he shall baptize you with the Holy 
Ghost and with fire." It looks very much as if, in the 
unsettled state of religious feeling and general fever of 
expectation, the people were ready, not to say eager, to 
acknowledge John as the promised Messiah, and that 
this wish on their part he was constantly compelled to 
resist. " He confessed and denied not ; but confessed 
I am not the Christ." And when Christ came forth 
from the retirement of his youth and early manhood to 
enter upon his public ministry, John immediately and 
gladly acknowledged him and his claims : " Behold the 
Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world." 
Dis joy was the joy of one whose anxious waiting is 
ended, and whose prophecy is fulfilled. "This is he," 
he exclaimed, "of whom I said, after me cometh a 
man which is preferred before me ; for he was before 
me." 

And subsequently, when John's disciples in a fit of 
jealously, because they saw the growing favor, the 
ascendency of Jesus, and the people flocking to him for 
baptism as they used to flock to John, came to him to 
complain about it, John quieted them by telling them 
.this is as it ought to be and as I told you it would 
be. "Ye yourselves bear me witness that I said I 
am not the Christ, but that I am sent before him." 
And then he exhibited his freedom from all jealousy, 



A Study of John the Baptist. 29 

or rivalry, or disappointed ambition by the very happy 
and beautiful illustration, " He that hath the bride is 
the bridegroom ; but the friend of the bridegroom 
which standeth and heareth him, rejoiceth greatly be- 
cause of the bridegroom's voice ; this my joy, therefore 
is fulfilled." John meant to say, I am simply the friend 
of the Bridegroom. I came not to win the affections 
of the bride, which is the Church of Christ, but to pre- 
pare the way for the heavenly Bridegroom ; and now 
that he has come, and I hear his voice, my mission and 
my joy are alike fulfilled. Then he adds the senten- 
tious words : " He must increase, but I must decrease." 
We are wont to think of John the Baptist as possess- 
ing a stern and rugged character, severe in his spirit as 
in his diet and dress, strong, even vehement, in his 
denunciations, having about him something of the 
wildness of the wilderness in which he preached, 
rough and brusque in his manner, independent 
in his methods of working, and having little refine- 
ment and delicacy of feeling. So he is painted 
by the old artists. But this view of his character 
is an utterly mistaken one. He was, indeed, plain, 
and honest, and outspoken in his preaching. He was 
no time-server. He uttered a call to repentance, and 
under his earnest and faithful appeals men were made 
to tremble and to submit to his significant baptism. So 
holy and just was he that the wicked Herod feared him, 



30 A Study of John the Baptist. 

and yet he was so discreet and persuasive of speech 
that it is said that when Herod heard him, he did many 
things and heard him gladly. It is one of the most 
difficult duties to tell a man the truth about himself, 
and give him honest counsel, and at the same time 
secure his confidence and obedience. This John did 
to Herod. And there were such simplicity and meek? 
ness, as well as nobility and grandeur about this old 
prophet, that Christ said of him in loving recognition : 
" Among them that are born of women there hath not 
risen a greater than John the Baptist." 

See how his humility and sincerity shine out in the 
fact that he knew his place and his mission, and was 
content with them. He was not eaten up with unholy 
ambition. His followers would have acknowledged him 
as the Messiah. They wanted to do it. They seemed 
determined to do it. But he resisted all their endeav- 
ors, refusing the honors which they were ready to heap 
upon him, and persisting in declaring himself the 
simple prophet and forerunner of Jesus, that he was. 
In all his preaching he put Christ to the front, and 
himself to the rear. He never allowed the thoughts of 
his hearers to rest on himself, but always pointed them 
to him who was to come. " There cometh one after me 
that is mightier than I." " I am not he." "This is he 
of whom I told you." " Behold the Lamb of God." 
Oh, how true he was to the place where God put him 



A Study of John the Baptist. 3 r 

and the mission which God gave him, willing to be just 
there, and to do just that, and nothing more ! 

Then, too, see his great magnanimity, for he could 
see his own star declining, and that of Jesus rising 
more and more, and yet not only be free from all 
bitterness and jealously, but rejoice in it with a real 
and holy joy. This, it seems to me, was evidence of 
the highest manhood. I had almost said, of a spirit 
more than human. For how apt men are to rejoice in 
their own exaltation, even though it be at the expense 
of another ; how apt to think to lift one's self up by 
putting another down, to think to increase one's own 
brightness and glory by casting another into the shade, 
to think to magnify one's own reputation by deprecia- 
ting another's ! How difficult it is to rejoice in another's 
advancement and prosperity, and have no touch of envy 
and no feeling of bitterness, to find yourself, it may be, 
growing poorer and poorer, and less and less noticed, 
while your neighbor is on the high road of success, and 
enjoys the sunlight of popular favor ! A retiring min- 
ister might find it something of a test of his piety to 
see himself dropping out of the affections of his peo- 
ple who are dear to him as life itself, and his sucessor 
taking his place. All men are human. While visiting 
recently the battle-fields of the rebellion, and recalling 
the sad scenes of other days, there was nothing that so 
stirred my soul with indignation as the thought that 



32 A Study of John the Baptist. 

more than one victory was lost, and thousands of 
precious lives sacrificed, because of a rivalry among 
our generals — some fearing lest others should gain 
distinguishing honors, and therefore failing to come to 
their support. 

What a beautiful illustration we have in John of that 
unselfish, magnanimous spirit which is so rare in the 
world S We must remember that Jesus was looked 
upon, at least by John's disciples, as in some sense his 
rival. Jesus' disciples had been, in very many instances, 
John's disciples. They left John to follow Christ. 
Christ's authority was increasing. His followers were 
increasing. His kingdom was being built up, we may 
say, on the ruins of John's influence and success. It 
was natural, at least it was according to human nature, 
that John should sympathize with the feelings of his 
disciples who remained with him. But no ; with a 
noble freedom from envy, and a noble self-forgetful- 
ness, he saw what was taking place, and rejoiced in it, 
and could gladly see his own influence waning, if 
Christ's was only increasing ; willing that his star 
should go down in forgetfulness and oblivion, if he 
could only see Christ's star ascend into mid heaven 
and fill the whole earth with its effulgence. 

And so his words were the maxim of his own life, 
and a prophecy for the future. Christ's kingdom and 
power and dominion should increase everywhere and 



A Study of John the Baptist. 33 

evermore. John's disciples should disappear, but 
Christ's should be multiplied. John's influence should 
die, but Christ's should live, until the whole " earth 
should be brought under its control. " He must in- 
crease, but I must decrease." 

Let us think more of John the Baptist, and of his 
noble, magnanimous character than we have been wont, 
and let us try to possess his rare and beautiful spirit, 
for these words of his contain not only the secret of 
his life, but the rule and maxim of all Christian living. 
There must be the gradual increase of Christ in the 
soul, and the gradual disappearance of self. 




V. THE INCREASING CHRIST, AND THE 
DECREASING SELF. 



THE INCREASING CHRIST AND THE DE- 
CREASING SELF. 

The significant reply of John the Baptist, " He must 
increase, but I must decrease," contained not only the 
secret of his own life, but the rule and maxim of every 
Christian life. There must be the gradual increase of 
Christ, and the gradual disappearance of self. 

And by " self " I mean not personalicy, not you as a 
whole, as a conscious being. That is not to disappear, 
or to be weakened, or to grow less, but rather to be 
strengthened and developed. When we speak in the 
language of the Bible, of Christ's becoming "all in 
all," we do not think of a kind of Christian pantheism, 
or Buddhistic annihilation, by which personality, con- 
sciousness, self, is to be lost and swallowed up in 
Christ. No man is so much himself as the Christian. 
No man preserves so much of himself as the Christian. 
It was when the prodigal came to himself, that is, when 
he found his lost self, that he returned to his father. 
The Christian finds his life. He saves his soul, that 
spirit of his which is personal, conscious, loving, im- 
mortal, which is to go on expanding throughout the 
endless eternities, in "increasing knowledge, increasing 



34 The Increasing Christ 

powers, increasing occupations." That is not the self 
that is to be destroyed but to be kept, not the self that 
is to decrease, but to increase. 

But I use the word " self ' as referring to that 
tendency or part of man's nature which refuses to bow 
to the supremacy of the will of God, and resists the 
work and spirit of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is 
what the Scriptures call " the heart of stone," " the 
law of sin," "the old man with his deeds." It is this 
self, which in the unrenewed heart is regnant and 
supreme, that must decrease more and more, and will 
decrease as Christ is allowed to increase in the soul. 

This self appears, first, in the form of self-will. 
This indicates a man's attitude towards his Maker. 
There ought to be but one supreme will in the universe. 
He who made all should govern all. The child who 
sets up his will against wise parental authority, intro- 
duces rebellion into the home, and is said to be wilful. 
The home is at peace when all wills are one. The uni- 
verse is at peace when all wills are in harmony with the 
divine will. When man arrays himself against that 
one holy and beneficent will, as revealed in the word of 
God, in the law of his being and in his own conscience, 
he brings rebellion and disorder into the universe and 
into his own soul. That is self-will opposed to the 
divine will. 

Need I say, then, that if Christ is to increase, self- 



and the Decreasing Self. 35 

will must decrease ? The very essence of religion is 
submission, the simple submission of the heart and 
will to Christ. It exalts the will of Jesus to the throne. 
It acknowledges him as Lord and Master. All sin 
resolves itself into this one defiant declaration, " We 
will not have this man to reign over us." There can 
be no religion, there can be no peace or hope, until the 
will is broken and subdued. Is it an easy thing ? All 
men have not equal strength of will. With some how 
difficult, how prolonged is the stuuggle, before the un- 
bending, iron will is brought to yield, saying, "I submit 
to thee, O, will divine," and sweet peace reigns in the 
soul ! And yet, until a man is brought to that place he 
cannot truly be said to be Christ's. We certainly 
ought not to think ourselves to be his, unless we put 
his will first, and make ours subordinate. Christ said, 
if any man will be my disciple, let him take up his 
cross. And the first thing to be crucified on that cross 
is self-will. When we have given up our opposition to 
God and duty and the voice of conscience, when we 
have bowed submissively as a little child, heart-broken 
and will-broken, then we are his. 

But even when we think we have surrendered our 
will to Christ, how much of self-will sometimes still 
remains ? We seem determined to have our way, 
rather than walk in God's way. We are apt to mistake 
self-will for principle, when it is nothing in the world 



36 The Increasing Christ 

but self-will. There is no more difficult man to get 
along with than the one who is conscientiously wilful. 
And it is this self-will that makes us unwilling to obey 
the commands of Christ, and unsubmissive to the 
appointments of God's providence. Oh, when will 
this proud I of self-will disappear in us all. and the 
will of Christ be allowed to reign supreme in our 
acquiescent and obedient spirits? If I am his, "he 
must increase, but I must decrease." 

" My Jesus, as thou wilt ! 

Oh, may thy will be mine ! 
Into thy hand of love 

I would my all resign ; 
Through sorrow or through joy, 

Conduct me as thine own, 
And help me still to say, 

My Lord, thy will be done ! 

" My Jesus, as thou wilt ! 

All shall be well with me ; 
Each changing future scene 

I gladly trust with thee. 
Straight to my home above 

I travel calmly on, 
And sing in life or death, 

My Lord, thy will be done ! " 

Again, this unholy self, which will decrease more and 
more before the increase of Christ in the soul, appears 



and the Decreasing Self. 37 

in the form of self -righteousness. As self-will indicates a 
man's attitude towards God, self-righteousness indicates 
a man's estimate of himself. By self-righteousness I 
do not mean a desire for holiness of character and life, 
an effort to overcome the evil tendencies of the heart, 
a determination to live honestly and uprightly. All 
this is commendable in the sight of God and man, and 
ought not to grow weaker, but to grow stronger, and 
to increase in a man until he dies. Woe to the man 
whose whole life is not a prolonged and vigorous strug- 
gle to be holier and better ! But by self-righteousness 
I mean that boastful satisfaction in the sufficient good- 
ness of one's own character, which is so common, 
which makes a man look upon himself as possessing 
superior moral attainments, and which blinds his eyes 
to his imperfections and sins, and above all to the 
offered grace of Christ, which alone brings salvation. 
Human nature has in it a Pharisaic element. There is 
a germ of the Pharisee in every soul. To justify one's 
self, to exalt one's self, to be comfortably satisfied with 
one's self, is as natural as it is to breathe. And it is 
this feeling, which is so common, so universal, that 
often blocks the soul's way to repentance and the 
acceptance of Christ as a needed Saviour. The soul 
may be so full of self that it has absolutely no room 
for Christ, and preaching is often trying to put the 
gospel into hearts that have no empty corner. It is 



38 The Increasing Christ 

giving bread to the full, and sending a physician to 
men who think their weight and color are indications 
of unquestioned health. 

Now, Christ came not to call the righteous but sin- 
ners to repentance. They that are whole need not a 
physician, but they that are sick. Tq the Scribes and 
Pharisees Jesus spoke those words which were, perhaps, 
the most cutting that ever fell from his lips, "publicans 
and harlots go into the kingdom of God before you." 
Those who feel themselves emptied of character, of 
reputation, of the proud consciousness of personal ex- 
cellence, those are the ones who seek for Christ, who 
have room for Christ, who admit Christ into the soul. 
There is an obvious law of physics, that two bodies 
cannot occupy the same space at the same time. Self 
must be out if Christ is in. Self must decrease if 
Christ is to increase. When the soul gives up its 
independence, then it learns to depend on the Saviour ; 
when it loses faith in its own righteousness, then it 
learns to build on the blood and righteousness of 
Jesus. * 

" Thy cross, not mine, O Christ, 

Has borne the awful load 
Of sins that none could bear 

But the incarnate God. 
To whom, save thee, who canst alone 
For sin atone, Lord, shall I flee ? 



and the Decreasing Self, 39 

" Thy death, not mine, O Christ, 

Has paid the ransom due ; 
Ten thousand deaths like mine 

Would have been all too few; 
To whom, save thee, who canst alone 
For sin atone, Lord shall I flee ? 

" Thy righteousness alone 

Can clothe and beautify ; 
I wrap it round my soul, 

In this I'll live and die ; 
To whom, save thee, who canst alone 
For sin atone, Lord, shall I flee ? " 

Once more, this unholy self, which must decrease 
more and more before the increase of Christ in the 
soul, appears in the form of selfishness. As self-will 
indicates a man's attitude towards God, and self- 
righteousness indicates a man's estimate of himself, 
selfishness indicates his relation towards his neighbors 
and fellowmen. It may be defined as a disregard of 
the rights and privileges of others for the sake of 
gratifying one's own feelings and desires. Archbishop 
Whately says :' " Selfishness consists not in the indulg- 
ing of this or that particular propensity, but in dis- 
regarding, for the sake of any kind of personal gratifi- 
cation or advantage, the rights or the feelings of other 
men. It is therefore a negative quality, that is, it con- 
sists in not considering what is due to one's neighbors, 



40 The Increasing Christ 



through a deficiency of justice or benevolence, and 
selfishness accordingly will show itself in as many 
different shapes as there are different dispositions in 
men. You may see these differences even in very 
young children. One selfish child, who is greedy, will 
seek to keep all the cakes and sweetmeats to himself ; 
another, who is idle, will not care what trouble he 
causes others so he can save his own ; another, who is 
vain, will seek to obtain the credit which is due to 
others ; one who is covetous, will seek to gain at 
another's expense, etc. In short, each person has a 
self of his own. And consequently, though you may 
be of a character very unlike that of some selfish per- 
son, you may yet be, in your own way, quite as selfish 
as he." 

If we regard our rights as superior to those of others, 
and gratify our desires to the neglect of those of others, 
and follow out our way and will regardless of the 
wishes of others, we are indulging that spirit which is 
in direct antagonism with the gospel, and which Christ 
came to exterminate in the earth. He it was who came 
not to do his own will, but the will of him who sent 
him, who ever went about doing good, and who " though 
he was rich, yet for our sakes became poor, that we 
through his poverty might be rich." When his spirit 
triumphs over the cursed spirit of selfishness, when 
it increases in the world and in the souls of men, in 



and tJie Decreasing Self. 4.1 

your heart and mine, then will men be loving, consider- 
ate, thoughtful, denying themselves for others' comfort 
and happiness, rinding their joy in the joy of a helpful 
and loving ministry. He must increase, but we, the 
selfish we, must decrease. 

Here then we have this trinity of evils, self-will, self- 
righteousness, and selfishness, which are the sum and 
substance of all sin ; and over against them is that 
trinity of Christian graces and excellences, faith, hope, 
and charity, a submissive faith in the one supreme will 
of the universe, hope in the blood and righteousness of 
Jesus Christ, and charity which " suffereth long and is 
kind, envieth not, vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, 
doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, 
is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil. 1 ' Those shall 
pass away with all the unfruitful works of darkness. 
But these shall abide, the blessed fruits of Christ's 
increasing triumph in the world. 




VI. HONEST DOUBT 



VI. 
HONEST DOUBT. 

Nicodemus was a timid, but evidently an honest in- 
quirer after truth. He had not yet the courage which 
comes from conviction, yet his mind was in a healthy 
ferment. He was restless, dissatisfied with the old 
paths, longing for new light, yet not fully prepared to 
accept Christ's teachings and follow him, questioning 
where he could not understand, and failing to under- 
stand because of the blinding unbelief which still 
lingered in his heart. His whole conduct and manner 
disclose a mind troubled, perplexed, unwilling to be- 
lieve, unless it can know the " how " and the " why," 
asking "how can a man be born when he is old?" 
and persistently inquiring, " how can these things be ? " 
and yet candid and honest — honest with itself, and 
desirous to be honest with the truth. The unbelief of 
Nicodemus was vastly different from that dishonest 
skepticism which is ever false to hidden conviction, 
and vastly different from that flippant unbelief which 
has never inquired after truth, and yet thinks it knows 
everything. Nicodemus was sincere in coming to 
Christ, and, although he doubted before he came, and 
doubted after he came, yet he was serious and earnest 



44 Honest Doitbt. 



and candid. He may be held up with Thomas as an 
illustration of honest doubt. 

There is such a thing as ho7iest doubt. We are wont 
to use the terms " skeptic " and " skepticism " always 
as terms of reproach, and sometimes, perhaps, speak 
of them in words of too severe condemnation. All 
skepticism does not possess the same spirit. There is 
infidelity which is hostile, bitter, irreverent and unrea- 
sonable. It not only will not be convinced, but it will 
not listen and inquire calmly and candidly. It closes 
its ears with obstinate prejudices, and opens its mouth 
in conceited derision. Such infidelity can hardly be 
denounced too severely, for it is most unfair and un- 
righteous. But there is unbelief which is only one 
stage in the process of inquiry. While frankly con- 
fessing its doubts, it is willing to weigh and consider ; 
it investigates reverently ; it seeks for further evidence 
and additional light ; it longs to know what is truth, 
and holds itself in readiness to accept it. It reveals 
the unrest of the heart, and is undoubtedly attended 
with danger, as everything short of full faith in Christ 
must be ; and yet it may be a stepping stone to the 
saving faith of the gospel. 

Thomas is called doubting or unbelieving Thomas, 
not because he was bitterly opposed to the fact of 
Christ's resurrection, but because, it may be, by his 
very constitution of mind, he needed more evidence 



Honest Doubt. 45 

than others in order to be convinced. Some men seem 
to be constitutionally more incredulous and skeptical 
than others. Thomas said, " Except I shall see in his 
hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the 
print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, I 
will not believe." Jesus did not denounce him for his 
unbelief, but condescendingly and lovingly accorded to 
him the very evidence which he demanded. The result 
proved the wisdom of Christ's course, and that Thomas 
was an honest skeptic, and wanted only to discover and 
be convinced of the truth. For when the evidence 
was presented in the pierced hands and side of the 
risen Christ, the disciple's unbelief was gone, and he 
gave his heart anew to Christ in loving and adoring 
faith, confessing, " My Lord, and my God." We shall 
do well to learn the lesson, and treat honest doubt as 
gently and patiently as did Christ himself, that we may 
lead it on to a sincere and saving faith. 

In like manner, Nicodemus may be regarded as 
thoroughly honest. His inquiry, " How can these 
things be ? " was the deliberate, thoughtful inquiry of 
a mind that was not opposed to conviction, but longed 
to have a deeper insight into spiritual things, and to 
comprehend the philosophy of Christian truth. His 
unbelief was unreasonable, as Christ faithfully showed 
him ; and yet, in due time, it passed over into the 



46 Honest Doubt. 



genuine faith of full discipleship. We find him sub- 
sequently defending Christ before the Pharisees, and 
at last showing his reverent attachment for him by- 
bringing a hundred pound weight of myrrh and aloes, 
a costly offering for his dead body. In both instances 
the sacred writer is careful to tell us that it was the 
same Nicodemus who came to Jesus by night. 

There are, undoubtedly, to-day honest doubters in 
our communities and congregations. They are familiar 
with the great truths of the Christian faith, but have 
never been brought to accept them. They do not 
obstinately refuse to listen to the claims of the Lord 
Jesus Christ ; they do not intend to be unreasonable ; 
in their better moments they wish they could know the 
truth and find rest in it, for the most unrestful thing 
in this world is unbelief. 

There is but one remedy for honest doubt. There is 
but one place for it to carry its inquiries, viz., to Christ. 
All doubters should be followers of Nicodemus. His 
restless heart did not seek to find the answers to its 
inquiries within itself. Much less did he go to the 
Pharisees who were the enemies of Christ. But he 
went directly to him. He sought out him who alone 
could relieve his doubts and remove his difficulties. 
This was the only proper and reasonable thing for him 
to do. I am aware that many men, when they are trou- 



Honest Doubt 47 

bled with religious doubts, think that they can work out 
of them themselves by their own unaided wisdom ; or, 
what is worse, they take counsel with those who are more 
skeptical than themselves, the avowed enemies of 
Christ, surrounding themselves with infidel books and 
publications to the neglect of Christ and his Word. It 
takes no prophet to foretell the end of such a course, 
and no man can honestly say that that is being just to 
Christ or just to the soul. 

Christ has some rights in this matter. He has a 
right to be heard, a right which ever} 7 man has, inno- 
cent or guilty. It is too bad to be compelled to plead 
with men to grant to the Son of God, the divine 
Saviour of the world, that which they feel in honor 
bound to grant to the most debased criminal. 

If you, my dear reader, have any doubts about Christ, 
his truth or his personal claims upon your faith as your 
only Saviour, the only just and honorable thing to be 
done is to go directly to him, as Nicodemus went. It 
is better to go to him in the dark than not at all, in 
secret, without the knowledge of any earthly friend, if 
you dare not go openly. But I beseech you, do not 
fail to go to him, and into his gentle, patient and loving 
ear pour all your doubts and perplexities, being assured 
that he will meet you in the fulness of his power and 
grace, and give you light for darkness, peace for unrest, 



48 Honest Doubt. 



certainty for doubt, and the blessed possession of a 
joyous hope for all your anxious fears. 

Tholuck, the eminent interpreter and simple-hearted 
Christian, once said of his conversion : " The 
thought of salvation through Christ was at that time 
a strange one to me ; it was poetical, that was my first 
thought; it was beautiful; at last I recognized it as 
divine ; and my soul, torn by the struggles of philoso- 
phy, found peace in Jesus." 




VII. THE OPEN DOOR. 



VII. 

THE OPEN DOOR, 

THE REWARD OF FIDELITY. 

A single verse in Christ's message to the church in 
Philadelphia, that ancient " city of brotherly love " 
(Rev. iii. 8), contains a very important principle of 
action in Christ's dealings with his people. The verse 
reads as follows : " Behold, I have set before thee an 
open door, and no man can shut it ; for thou hast little 
strength [not a little strength, for that would have been 
an acknowledgement of more strength than the church 
had], and hast kept my word, and hast not denied my 
name." Christian fidelity shall not go unrewarded. 
Christ's commendation is something better than words. 

In the subsequent verses of this message Christ said 
to this faithful church, that she should receive honor 
from an unbelieving world. Men should come and 
worship at her feet, and know that Christ had loved 
her. Because she had kept the Word of his patience, 
he also would keep her from the hour of temptation. 
The faithful should receive the divine favor. Whoever 
keept Christ's word, Christ would keep him. This 
prophecy was proved true. Even the infidel historian, 
Gibbon, was compelled to acknowledge it in a remark- 



5o The Open Door. 



able passage, which reads thus : " In the loss of 
Ephesus the Christians deplored the fall of the first 
angel, the extinction of the first candlestick of the 
Revelation ; the desolation is complete ; and the tem- 
ple of Diana or the church of Mary will equally elude 
the search of the curious traveler. The circus and three 
stately theatres of Laodicea are now peopled with 
wolves and foxes ; Sardis is reduced to a .miserable 
village ; the God of Mahomet, without a rival or a 
son, is invoked in the mosques of Thyatira and Perga- 
mus ; and the populousness of Smyrna is supported by 
the foreign trade of the Franks and Armenians. 
Philadelphia alone has been saved by prophecy, or 
courage. At a distance from the sea, forgotten by the 
emperors, encompassed on all sides by the Turks, her 
valiant citizens defended their religion and freedom 
above four-score years, and at length capitulated with 
the proudest of Ottomans. Among the Greek colonies 
and churches of Asia, Philadelphia is still erect — a 
column in a scene of ruins — a pleasing example that 
the paths of honor and safety may sometimes be the 
same." 

But the eighth verse sets forth the peculiar reward 
of fidelity and the manner in which Christ deals with 
his faithful ones. The " open door " is undoubtedly 
a door opening out into a larger field of service and 
usefulness, a fresh and wider opportunity to preach the 



The Open Door. 51 

word which they had kept, and proclaim the sa\ing 
name which they had not denied. Paul wrote to the 
Corinthians : " I came to Troas to preach Christ's 
gospel, and a door was opened unto me of the Lord." 
And again he wrote: "A great and effectual door is 
opened unto- me, and there are many adversaries." 
Because the Philadelphian Christians had kept Christ's 
word and honored his name, Christ proposed to honor 
and reward them — how? by giving them his thanks 
and permitting them to rest from their labors ? No, 
no. That is not Christ's method of compensating his 
laborers. But it was rather by giving them increased 
oppotunities to serve him. This is the great lesson 
which Christ teaches us, that in his kingdom the reward 
of fidelity is the opportunity for larger service for him. 
Have we thought of it ? Have we learned the lesson ? 
Do we welcome it to-day ? This is the way in which 
Christ rewards the faithful — if we serve him faithfully 
to-day, he will reward us by permitting us to serve him 
more to-morrow; if we are faithful in the little field 
which we now occupy, he will give us an open door to 
a larger and a grander service ; if we use our one 
talent well, he will make it two talents that we may 
give him the more honor. 

I am aware that this is not the way in which even 
good Christian men usually reason. They are quite 



52 The Open Door, 



apt to say — I have had my share of labor, and service, 
and giving ; I think I have done and borne my part ; 
and now let some one else take the oars, while I take a 
little rest in compensation for what I have, done ; I 
think I have earned a little cessation from labor and a 
little let up from so many calls. But Christ says : 
" My dear, faithful disciple, because thou hast been so 
faithful, and hast done so much and so well, I am 
going to honor thee by giving thee an open door, and 
inviting thee to a larger service, and asking thee to do 
more for me." 1 This is the principle Christ works on, 
and this is the way he looks at it. 

For we must remember how universally true it is that 
fidelity in one sphere fits for a larger and a higher 
sphere. The child at school, who is faithful in the 
lower grades, is prepared to advance to higher and 
more interesting studies. The clerk in the store by his 
fidelity becomes qualified for more important and re- 
sponsible trusts. The mechanic who serves well his 
apprenticeship is prepared to be a master workman. 
The youthful minister of Christ who devotes himself 
completely and conscientiously to the demands of his 
little parishy becomes fitted to enter a larger field and 
bear heavier burdens. Men rise as they are fitted to 
rise. The subordinate officer who shows his valor and 
skill in commanding a single company, prepares him- 
self to take charge of a regiment or a brigade. It is 



The Open Door. 53 

the smaller and humbler service well performed that 
fits for those larger duties and -spheres of activity, 
which lie before us in life. It is so in Christ's service. 
He who is faithful in the trusts and duties of to- day- 
becomes qualified for the higher duties and nobler 
trusts of to-morrow. Christ puts disciplined men in the 
front ranks and on the high places of the field. 

Moreover, it is fidelity that earns promotion. It not 
only fits a man for a higher place, but it makes him 
worthy of it. The clerk who neglects his tasks, be- 
cause he feels himself above his position, is not likely 
to get above it. Preferment follows merit. The cap- 
tain who proves himself valiant and competent 
to command, is brevetted. Unfaithfulness, disobe- 
dience, neglect, never lie in the line of promotion. 
Man rewards fidelity, and so does God. " Because 
thou hast been faithful over a few things," said Christ, 
" I will make thee ruler over many things." " Because 
thou hast kept my word and hast not denied my name, 
behold I have set before thee an open door, and no 
man can shut it." I have given thee a greater honor, 
an enlarged field, a grander opportunity, and no man 
can deprive thee of it. He that is faithful in a little 
will have the opportunity to be faithful in much. 

And oh, my brother, what if the open door, which is 
the reward of fidelity, be the door of heaven ! And 
what if the question whether that door, that entrance 



54 The Open Door. 



into life, that gate of pearl, shall be open or shut to us 
at last, depends upon whether we are now keeping his 
word and not denying his name ! When I read the 
Master's solemn words about the unfaithful virgins 
standing and knocking at the shut door and finding no 
admittance to the joys of the feast ; and when I hear 
him saying to the faithful servant, as if so much had 
depended on his fidelity, " Well done, good and faith- 
ful servant, thou hast been faithful over a few things ; 
I will make thee ruler over many things ; enter thou 
into the joy of thy Lord," my thoughts are carried for- 
ward irresistibly to the feast and the joy of heaven. I 
know that salvation is of grace, that it is not by works 
of righteousness which we have done, but by his mercy 
that he saves us. I love to join with you in the peni- 
tential hymn, 

" I know I am weak and sinful, 

It comes to me more and more ; 
Bnt when the dear Saviour shall bid me come in, 

I'll enter the open door." 

But whom will he bid to enter there, if it be not 
those who keep his word and do not deny his name ? 
And what other evidence have we that we are his, and 
have right to the tree of life, except that we do so keep 
his word, both of faith and commandment, and do not 
deny his name, being kept faithful by his almighty 



The Open Door. 55 

grace? God forbid that we should limit his free, 
sovereign grace. God forbid that we should pervert 
his free grace into an occasion of unfaithfulness and 
disobedience. 

Let every servant of Christ, then, occupy faithfully 
the place where he now is, and do well the duty of the 
hour, that he may be fitted for some larger service and 
some higher duty, and may be worthy of it. Is any 
one saying, in deep humility of spirit or in grateful 
desire — 

" I long to serve thee more ; 
Reveal an open door, 

Saviour, to me : 
Then counting all but loss, 
I'll glory in the cross, 

And follow thee." 

Remember that the door to new service is not open 
to the inactive and the unfaithful, but to the hands that 
are busy, the hearts that are full of zeal, and the feet 
that are running in the way of God's commandments. 
Be faithful ; keep Christ's word ; do not deny his name, 
either by an un-Christian faith or an un-Christian life, 
that your divine Master may own and reward you 
graciously. 

Moreover, fail not to look upon every open door, 
every fresh opportunity to serve Christ as a new privi- 



$6 The Open Door. 



lege and honor which he confers upon you, and which 
is to be both the reward and the test of your fidelity. 
Count it your peculiar joy that you may honor with all 
your powers, and all your hours, and all your substance, 
him who suffered shame for you. Earth has no sweeter 
voice than the call of duty. Earth has no higher 
glory than the service of Christ. Blessed is the man, 
not whose work is done and whose hands are folded, 
but who has something more to do for Christ, whose 
past faithfulness in service Christ still rewards by new 
opportunities. Turn not away from any open door, for 
it is Christ's token of approval, and may be the very 
gate of heaven to your willing feet. Indeed, methinks 
that heaven would cease to be heaven, if there was no 
offering of service to Jesus there. Be faithful, then, to 
the present ; this, this is the open door which God has 
set before you. As sings the Quaker poet — 

" The present, the present is all thou hast 

For thy sure possessing ; 
Like the patriarch's angel, hold it fast 

Till it gives its blessing. 



" Peopling the shadows, we turn from him 

And from one another ; 
All is spectral, and vague, and dim 

Save God and our brother. 



The Open Door. 57 

" O restless spirit ! wherefore strain 

Beyond thy sphere ; 
Heaven and hell, with their joy and pain, 

Are now and here. 

" Back to thyself is measured well 

All thou hast given ; 
Thy neighbor's wrong is thy present hell, 

His bliss thy heaven. 

' Leaning on God, make with reverent meekness 

His own thy will, 
And with strength from him shall thy utter weakness 

Life's task fulfil." 




VIII. CHRISTIAN SOBERNESS. 



VIII. 
CHRISTIAN SOBERNESS 

There is this peculiarity about Christian soberness, 
viz., it is so thoroughly in earnest that it is a species of 
intoxication. We say that a man is " sober " when he 
has not been drinking, when he is free from the in- 
fluence of intoxicating spirits. God says we are sober 
when we have been drinking so much of his spirit and 
truth that we are completely under their influence. 

Christian earnestness and zeal have always been 
liable to the charge of an insane folly and intoxication. 
The friends of Christ went out to lay hold of him, for 
they said, " He is beside himself." The disciples on 
the day of Pentecost were accused of being filled with 
new wine. Festus told Paul that he was mad. The 
apostle confessed to the Corinthians, as if his conduct 
needed an explanation, " Whether we be beside our- 
selves, it is to God." And to the Christians at Ephesus 
he wrote, " Be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess, 
but be filled with the Spirit." Feel that other kind of 
intoxication, that holy and joyous exhilaration of God's 
Spirit, which, instead of bewildering the faculties, 
quickens them ; instead of sending a blush of shame 
to the face, puts upon it a look of manliness and 



58 Christian Soberness 

humble courage ; instead of giving a stammering 
tongue, loosens it to speak forth the praise and the 
truth of God ; and, instead of giving the pitiful stag- 
gering of uncertain feet, gives the firm step in the path 
of duty, in the service of Christ, in deeds of charity 
and saving love. There is no excess in such intoxica- 
tion as that. 

The excessive moderation and soberness, as it is 
falsely called, which is so prevalent among men, even 
among Christian men, which looks coldly upon strong 
religious conviction and suspiciously upon revival in- 
fluences, which thinks it unmanly to weep over one's 
sins and to cry aloud to God for forgiveness, which 
would put respectability for excitement, and a lifeless 
inactivity for zeal, is entirely contrary to the spirit and 
truth of Christ — nay, more, is born of irreligion and 
the father of lies. 

Oh, for more of that true, intense gospel soberness, 
which makes the sinner feel that he is lost, and leads 
him to cry out, " What must I do to be saved ? " which 
makes him not only think about religion, but makes 
him earnest at the throne of grace as he pleads for 
mercy ; which excites him with a deep penitence for 
his sins, and the unutterable joy of forgiveness and 
the unutterable preciousness of Christ ; which burns 
up all indifference and fatal insensibility about 
the great truths of God and the spiritual needs of 



Christian Soberness. 



59 



men, and which fires the breast with a divine pas- 
sion and hurries it on errands of mercy and salvation ! 
Oh, for more of that Christian soberness, that com- 
mendable madness, that spiritual intoxication, which 
will make us all, like the great apostle, beside ourselves 
to God and to souls ! 



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IX. RELIGIOUS LIBERTY AND 
ITS ABUSES. 



IX. 
RELIGIOUS LIBERTY AND ITS ABUSES. 

Religious liberty is the organic law of the nation. 
The first amendment to the Constitution of the United 
States, which was secured by the earnest appeal of a 
committee of Virginia Baptists, and adopted in 1789, 
reads as follows : " Congress shall make no law re- 
specting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting 
the free exercise thereof, etc. ; " that is, there shall be 
no state church established and supported by the 
government on the one hand, and on the other hand 
there shall be no legislation adverse to any form of 
religion which the people or the individual citizen may 
elect. 

It is sometimes said that our nation is a Christian 
nation, that Christianity was the atmosphere in which 
our free government was born and cradled, that the 
principles of revealed religion lie at its foundation, that 
our common law has its basis in the law of God. This 
is true. It could hardly have been otherwise. Ours is 
a Christian civilization ; the founders of our Republic, 
in their views, their principles and their character, were 
the product of the seed-sowing of these Christian cen- 
turies. To have modelled the government after any 
other pattern, to have infused into it any other than 



62 Religions Liberty and its Abuses. 

Christian principles, would have been to turn back the 
dial of history, and to be blind to all the light and 
wisdom which had come to the Christian generations. 

Yet, under a free government, religion must be left 
to the voluntary choice of the people. There can be 
no legislation for the consciences of men. Whether a 
man shall choose one form of religion or another, or 
no form of religion, whether he shall be a believer or 
an infidel, a Protestant or a Catholic, a Christian or a 
Pagan, must be left to the individual conscience ; the 
government must not influence or interfere. It must 
grant to all the liberty of free and untramelled choice, 
and protect all in the exercise of that conscientious 
choice, reserving to itself, simply but always, the right 
to protect itself against any form of treason or im- 
morality under the cloak of religion. 

If, for instance, the Jesuits, who have plotted against 
almost every European government, and been expelled 
by them "all, should seek to undermine our government 
and destroy its free institutions, it would be the duty of 
the government to suppress them — not as Jesuits, but 
as traitors to the country of their adoption. Nothing 
is more obvious than that the practices of the Mormons 
are antagonistic to the first principles of morality and 
social order, and nothing is more discreditable to an 
enlightened government in this enlightened age than 
that this foul ulcer, under the sacred name of religion, 



Religions Liberty and its Abuses. 63 

is allowed to remain on the body politic. Religions 
liberty cannot mean liberty to indulge in gross im- 
morality or to organize treason, by which the fair name 
of the nation is smirched, or its very existence- threat- 
ened. Whatever is worthy of the holy name of religion, 
and the adherents of it, should be tolerated and pro- 
tected, but not the followers of Satan, though clothed 
in the stolen livery of heaven. All forms of religion, 
therefore, which do not antagonize the purity and life 
of free government, are to have an equal chance under 
it. That is religious liberty. 

For many years our Baptist fathers in this country 
were not permitted to enjoy the liberty of their holy 
faith. Though acknowledged to be pure in life, and 
intensely loyal and patriotic in their affections, they 
were unrighteously taxed for the support of a worship 
which they could not attend. They were fined, im- 
prisoned, and whipped for the simple offence of wor- 
shipping God as their conscience required. But in all 
their history and sufferings, it has been honorably true 
of them that they have cheerfully granted to others the 
rights and liberties which they have claimed for them- 
selves ; viz. : absolute uncontrol and freedom of con- 
science in all matters of religious faith and practice. 
No Baptist hand has ever been raised against the soul- 
freedom of any human being. 

But how else has religious liberty been abused ? 
Freedom of faith in matters of religion, the absence 



64 Religions Liberty and its Abuses. 

of any human restraint, has been sometimes interpreted 
to mean freedom from all restraint, liscense to dis- 
believe everything or to believe nothing. Since the 
government can prescribe no creed, and no human 
being or organization has any right to determine our 
faith, some have supposed that there are no prescrip- 
tions or limitations fixed by God, or revelation, or the 
moral nature of man, that religious liberty is liberty to 
have no religion, and that to be religiously free is to be 
free from all religion. So it happens that the most 
pronounced heretics and unbelievers delight to call 
themselves " free-thinkers," and religion, when it has 
emptied itself of all faith and substance and spiritual 
power, is called, "free religion." Independence of 
thought and belief are supposed by some persons to be 
secured only by breakieg away from the established 
faith of the centuries, and men who are very much 
afraid lest they shall be enslaved by somebody's else 
truth, are taken captive foolishly by somebody's else 
heresy, and call it freedom. 

It is sometimes regarded as evidence of growth, men- 
tal expansion and breadth, intellectual independence, 
to deny the great central truths of the gospel which 
have stood the test and been the basis of saving faith, 
for well-nigh three-score generations, as if religion 
were a matter of development and change (one gen- 
eration outgrowing the faith of the preceding), and not 



Religious Liberty and its Abuses. 65 

something which rests on the eternal verities of God. 
Doubt and skepticism attack the young to-day very 
much like children's diseases. Most persons outgrow 
them, and are not permanently affected ; but with 
some, the painful and fatal sequelce remain as long as 
they live. 

There can be no greater absurdity than to suppose 
that independence of thought is incompatible with 
orthodoxy of belief, that to be an independent thinker 
a man must be a "free thinker," and that to show 
one's freedom of belief a man must fall into the 
slavery of some exploded heresy. He who is free to 
believe is as free as he who is free to doubt, and a man 
may investigate carefully, may weigh independently, 
may question freely in matters of religious faith, and at 
length come, in the very exercise of his freedom, to 
the same conclusions which the greatest minds in all 
these Christian centuries have in like manner reached. 
He who settles down upon any of the accepted truths 
of religion, as of history or science, may do it in- 
dependently and in the manly use of his powers of 
reason, and may thereby show not his folly or depend- 
ence, but his superior wisdom. He who believes an 
error or a falsehood, when the truth is discoverable, is 
abusing the liberty with which God has endowed him, 
and may, in so doing, be sacrificing his boasted in- 
dependence ; for faith should always be bounded by 
the limitations of truth. 



X. SPIRITUAL LIBERTY. 



X 
SPIRITUAL LIBERTY. 

There is no subject more interesting than that of per- 
sonal freedom as related to moral conduct. Am I free 
to do wrong ? Am I free to go contrary to my moral 
convictions or the moral precepts of the Word of God ? 
In one sense, yes. That is, I have the power to do it. 
But in another sense, no. My liberty is not absolute, 
but is restricted by my moral nature, by the rights of 
others, and by the moral teachings of Christ 

And just here is a fatal fallacy into which men are 
forever falling. To some men liberty means the re- 
moval of all restraint, freedom to indulge any appetite 
or desire or sinful passion ; and anything short of this 
is bondage. But God's Word teaches exactly the 
opposite. He who uses what he calls his freedom to 
indulge in sin, has thereby forfeited his freedom, and 
become the slave of sin. He has sold himself into 
Egypt and put himself under the hardest of task- 
masters. " Know ye not," said Paul, " that to whom ye 
yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to 
whom ye obey, whether of sin unto death or of obedience 
unto righteousness ? " There is but one testimony in 
the Word of God. Cross-question it as you will, and 



66 Spiritual Liberty. 

you get but a single answer. A life of sin, instead of 
being a life of freedom, is a life of ignoble and debas- 
ing servitude. Sin reigns with a tyrant's power un- 
mercifully in the soul, bringing into subjection the 
soul's noblest faculties, laying upon its back its stinging 
lashes, keeping it in ignorance of the elevating truths of 
God and his love, sometimes crushing out all hope and 
aspirations after a higher and a better life, and paying 
at last as its wages for all service rendered and all 
shame and remorse incurred, death, and nothing but 
death. 

And this same divine revelation calls Christ 
" Saviour " and " Redeemer," who came to " preach 
deliverance to the captives, the recovering of sight to 
the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised," whose 
limbs are chafed and wounded by the chains which 
are on them. It tells of a liberty that is moral and 
spiritual, of an escape from the power of Satan and 
the bondage of evil, of affections that are set free, -of 
hopes that are uncaged and fly heavenward, of hands 
and feet that are unshackled, of immortal spirits that 
are redeemed and brought into the glorious liberty of 
the Son of God. More vital than civil liberty, great as 
is that blessing, and more important than religious 
liberty, and often enjoyed when that is denied, is this 
spiritual liberty, this true liberty of soul which Christ 
confers, which emancipates the whole nature of man 



Spiritual Liberty, 67 

from the dominion and curse of sin, and crowns it 
with the likeness and fellowship of the Son of God. 
" If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be 
free indeed." 

Yet this new, this higher liberty is not absolute in 
the sense of being without restraint or law or com- 
mandment. The Christian is no lawless antinomian, 
by a careless and reckless life left to bring disgrace 
upon the holy religion which he professes to accept. 
He bows to the authority of the pure precepts of the 
Gospel, and acknowledges the supremacy of the one 
perfect, sinless example in Christ He expects by the 
consistency and spirituality of bis life to prove to the 
world the sincerity of his profession and the genuine- 
ness of his hope. Paul did, indeed, say to Christians, 
" ye are not under law, but under grace." But by 
" law " he meant not the holy precepts of the gospel, 
but the ceremonial and legal system as a method of 
salvation. We are not under that We are not de- 
pendent for our hope of heaven upon the perfection of 
an imperfect righteousness, but hope to be saved by 
the infinite grace of God, which flows to us through 
our perfect and crucified Redeemer — " not under 
law, but under grace," not under the legal system, 
but under the Christian system, not saved by dead 
works, but from dead works, not under law to sin, but 
under law to Christ, free indeed to obey the God whom 



68 Spiritual Liberty. 



we love, and to engage in the holy service which Is our 
supreme delight; "as free," says Peter, "and not 
using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness, but as 
the servants (or the bond-servants) of God." Servants 
still 1 but under a new and blessed Master whom we 
have voluntarily chosen, with his yoke, which is easy, 
upon our willing necks, and his commandments, which 
are not grievous, written upon our loving and obedient 
hearts. 

This, then, is the conclusion of the whole matter, 
viz., that the highest liberty is found in a life of cheer- 
ful service under law to Christ. We live in a world 
that is under the reign of law, of law which has its seat 
in the bosom of God. The harmony of the universe 
depends upon the obedience of the universe. The 
drop of rain that falls from the clouds and buries itself 
at the root of a flower, the flower that drinks the mois- 
ture at its thirsty roots and converts it into beauty and 
fragrance, the star that moves noiselessly in its wonted 
orbit, uninterrupted and harmless, and drops its little 
light upon us as it moves, the comet that comes a 
strange and unexpected visitor in our heavens, and 
attracts to itself the wondering gaze of the learned and 
the unlearned, all act in uniform, unresisting obedience 
to divine law, which is but the expression of that 
supreme will that gives to the earth its fruitfulness and 
holds the planets in their courses. 



Spiritual Liberty. 69 

Christ is both Redeemer and Law-giver of the soul. 
He gave himself for our ransom, that he might redeem 
us from the power and penalty of our transgressions. 
And now he gives to us his wisdom, his Spirit and his 
grace to be the law and inspiration of our lives, that 
ever yielding to the touch of his will, and moving in 
the orbit of his love, we may be harmonized with the 
great God above us, and know the freedom which 
comes from glad obedience, the liberty which for man 
is found only in cheerful service to him who made him. 




XI. A LETTER TO A STUDENT. 



XI. 
A LETTER TO A STUDENT. 

My Dear Friend : — I was glad to have our brief 
conversation yesterday, and was only sorry that it could 
not be longer, so that I could have learned more fully 
the state of your mind as to religious things* One re- 
mark which you made led me to wish to say a few 
words more, which I am sure you will receive in the 
same kind spirit in which they are written, for I have 
only the kindest personal regard for you and desire for 
your highest good. The remark you made was in reply 
to my quotation of Christ's words, " seek ye first the 
kingdom of God " (Matt. 6 : 33). You appeared to 
throw discredit upon the authority and wisdom of 
Christ's words, and said in substance that " it was a 
vast field of discussion, and one so young as yourself 
could not be expected to have any settled convictions 
upon such things."" 

I sincerely hope that I misunderstood you, for I can- 
not believe that your studies have led you away from 
him who is acknowledged by all to be the greatest 
Teacher of moral and religious truth that the world 
has ever known, and who by common consent " spake 
as never man spake." I can conceive that your 
absorbing interest in your studies and the associations 



7 2 A Letter to a Student. 

of college life may have caused your heart to grow 
cold in religious things ; but I cannot believe that you 
have allowed your studies to unsettle your faith in him 
whose words have commanded the respect and admira- 
tion of the greatest minds known to history, have given 
birth to the highest thinking and the noblest living, 
have brought comfort and light and hope to men in 
the darkest experiences in life, have purified and ele- 
vated human character and society, and, in* a word, 
have been the chief source of what we call our modern 
civilization. Whatever other things may be in doubt, 
about these things there is and can be no question. 

I am aware that the whole field of religious discus- 
sion is a broad one. But the main points which enter 
into Christian faith and experience are not numerous, 
and are within the reach of all willing minds. For 
God's word was designed for us all, for the race, and 
not simply for the maturest and most highly educated. 
It is still true, as Christ said, that '* whosoever will do 
his will shall know of the doctrine." Because there- 
fore some may rashly doubt, it cannot relieve us in the 
least of the responsibility of having settled convictions 
about those greatest of all truths, truths that pertain to 
our soul's present and eternal well-being. 

Bnt I fear that young men sometimes deceive them- 
selves when they offer as an excuse for an unsettled 
faith " the broadness of the field of discussion." The 



A Letter to a Student. . 7$ 

true reason may be, after all, not the humble conscious- 
ness of inability and immaturity, but one which they 
would hardly dare to confess to themselves, viz., a 
proud superiority to the gospel of Christ, as if they 
had outgrown that system of revealed truth, which 
offers to man the only basis of true morality and of 
immortal hope, and contains in itself the proofs of its 
permanence and universality. Of course I do not 
believe that you have come to any such false and con- 
ceited estimate of yourself, and yet there is a danger 
against which you will allow me earnestly to warn you, 
that while thinking yourself to be unsettled in faith, 
simply holding your mind in equipoise, your opinions 
may be already settling in the wrong direction. And 
it must be remembered that it is true of unbelief, as 
Plato said of atheism, " it is a disease of the soul 
before it becomes an error of the understanding." 

Paul, who was the Bacon of his time, congratulated 
Timothy, that from a child he had known the Holy 
Scriptures, which were able to make him wise unto 
salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. Such 
has been your inestimable privilege. It may not in- 
deed prove that a religious faith is true, because it is 
held by one's father and mother. But that fact ought to 
secure for it a most candid and filial consideration, and 
we ought, before we discard it, to be sure that we have 
found something better, something that will do more 



74 



A Letter to a Student. 



and better for us than their faith has done for them. If 
their faith has brought to them the holiest joy and 
satisfaction, strength in weakness, light in darkness, 
solace in sorrow, and the blessed assurance of immor- 
tal life, is unbelief likely to do more for us than that ? 
The difficulty with unbelief is that it is un-belief. It 
takes away the soul's foundation, and leaves it nothing 
on which to rest. 

May you seek and possess that wisdom which is 
from above, and come to those firm convictions which 
are in harmony with the demands of our higher nature 
and with the plain teachings of the Word of God. 
May you be saved from making shipwreck of faith ; 
and may your cultivated powers be consecrated to the 
noblest service in which man can engage, the service 
of Jesus Christ. 

Being confident that you will, as an intelligent man, 
give to these things the candid and honest consider- 
ation which they deserve, and that, if you do, your 
decision will be such as will bring strength and peace 
to your own life, and joy to the hearts of those who 
love and pray for you, I remain, 

Your Sincere Friend. 



XII. CHRIST OUR PASCHAL LAMB. 



XII. 
CHRIST OUR PASCHAL LAMB. 

We wish to present some of the reasons which make 
it not only highly probable, but absolutely ceitain, that 
the ancient Jewish passover was typical of the sacrifice 
of Christ, and that the paschal lamb, whose body was 
eaten and whose blood was sprinkled upon the door- 
posts on that memorable night when the passover was 
instituted, was a type of Jesus. 

When we read, in the account of the deliverance of 
Israel from the power of Pharaoh, of the lamb that was 
slain for each household, we cannot but feel that it is a 
matter of no little significance that Christ should be 
called a lamb, or emphatically, the Lamb of God, as if 
he was the lamb which God had provided, the one 
sufficient lamb for all the families of men. Moreover, 
this title of Christ is used in such connections that it 
cannot possibly be made to refer to his meekness and 
gentleness of spirit, but must have reference to the 
giving up of his life as of a lamb slain. He is called 
" the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the 
world." He is said to have been " led as a lamb to 
the slaughter," and to be " the lamb slain from the 
foundation of the world." The slaying of the lamb of 



76 Christ our Paschal Lamb. 

the passover, then, would seem to foreshadow the death 
of Jesus. 

This will be still more evident when we look at the 
kind of lamb that was chosen for the passover offering. 
It was to be a lamb " without blemish." Now, it is ex- 
pressly stated of Christ, when his offering up of him- 
self is described, that he was " holy, harmless and 
undenled ; " and again, in the very language applied to 
the paschal lamb, it is said that we are redeemed "with 
the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without 
blemish and without spot." 

But as if to leave no doubt that Jesus is to be 
regarded as our paschal lamb, there was a remarkable 
instance of the fulfilment of prophecy. Of the paschal 
lamb it was commanded, "neither shall ye break a 
bone thereof." It was not to be separated. It was to 
be eaten in the house. No part of it could be carried 
out. The skeleton was to be left entire. The reason 
of this undoubtedly was that " the lamb was to be the 
symbol of unity — the unity of the family, the unity of 
the nation, the unity of God with his people whom he 
has taken into covenant with himself." Now when 
Jesus was crucified, and those who were with him, the 
Jews besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, 
and their death thereby hastened, because it was the 
preparation, and their bodies must not remain upon the 
cross on the Sabbath. The soldiers were commissioned 



Christ our Paschal Lamb. 77 

to do it. An unseen, yet important prophecy trembles 
lest it be violated and broken. Will Christ fulfil the 
conditions of the world's paschal lamb ? They came 
to the first cross, and brake the legs of the dying man. 
Then they passed by the Saviour and came to the third 
cross, and brake the legs of him who hung thereon. 
But when they turned to Jesus, and saw that he was 
dead already, they brake not his legs, but thrust a spear 
into his side. Then it is significantly added : " For 
these things were done that the Scripture might be ful- 
filled, a bone of him shall not be broken," language 
which by its previous use identifies Jesus with the lamb 
of the passover, and his sacrifice with its death. In 
Paul's letter to the Corinthians we make him say in our 
translation, " This is my body which is broken for you," 
and these words are the ones which are usually repeated 
at the Lord's Supper after the breaking of the bread. 
But this is a mistake. The best manuscripts have no 
such word as " broken," and read simply, " this is my 
body which is for you." Christ's body was not a 
broken body. The broken bread represents the slain, 
the crucified body of the Saviour ; but he was a true 
paschal lamb. Not a bone of him was broken. And 
the unbroken body of Christ becomes the symbol of 
that high, spiritual unity which exists between all of 
God's true people, of whom it is said, "Ye are one 
body in Christ," and which also exists between them 



78 Christ our Paschal Lamb. 

and God himself, a unity of which the crucified Christ 
is the source and centre. 

Again it is worthy of note, as proving the actual 
relation between the passover and the death of Christ, 
that Christ chose this festival, of all other festivals and 
of all other times, as the time when he should be put 
to death. Nothing can be more evident than that his 
dying, both its time and its manner, were foreseen and 
calculated by him. He had power to lay down his life, 
and he had power to take it again. The institution of 
the Lord's Supper at the close of the passover meal 
were also deeply significant. Christ's purpose is easily 
perceived. He would take advantage of the hour. When 
the thoughts of men were engaged in the passover 
rites, when they were reminded of God's gracious 
deliverance of their fathers from the unhappy bondage 
of Egypt, and were offering the lamb as God had 
commanded them in remembrance of the old covenant, 
Jesus by his death, in connection with the appointed 
festival, would offer himself to men as the fulfilment of 
the olden type, the lamb offered once for all, and would 
proclaim, not simply to Jewish families and groups, 
but to the whole human family the possibility of a 
greater deliverance from a bondage worse than 
Egyptian. For such we must understand to be the 
meaning of his words, " This is the new covenant in 
my blood (the blood of the true paschal lamb) which 



Christ our Paschal Lamb. 79 

is shed for many for the remission of sins." The old 
covenant was that which was given in the blood of 
lambs, when God visited Pharaoh in terrible judgment, 
but faithfully preserved his people. The new covenant 
— what is it but that which is given in the blood of the 
cross to those who have sought shelter there, when God 
shall finally punish the sin, the hardness of heart, the 
unbelief of the children of men ! " When I see the 
blood, I will pass over you " whose hearts have been 
sprinkled by it. And so Paul, with a firm faith in this 
covenant of Calvary, in this complete deliverance from 
the bondage and penalty of sin, a faith which we 
earnestly commend to all, and which all will do well to 
possess, exclaimed, " For even Christ our passover is 
crucified for us." 




XIII. THE CONDITION OF FORGIVENESS. 



XIII. 
THE CONDITION OP FORGIVENESS. 

There are some persons who seem to think that 
forgiveness is a sort of indiscriminate, unconditional 
bestowment of God's favor upon men, that God for- 
gives sinners, whether they ask him or not, that some- 
how, in God's dealing with men, pardon is forced upon 
them regardless of their moral freedom or any spiritual 
change, as if by a kind of air-pump God should force 
the breath of life into unwilling lungs, or at last should 
come with resurrection power to the souls that have 
spent their lives in spiritual death. But the Scriptures 
teach us that if we confess our sins, forgiveness will 
follow, and condition the divine pardon upon human 
penitence and confession. This simple condition can- 
not be said to take away from the freeness of salvation. 
Whatever may be had for the asking is free enough. 
If I can have my liberty by acknowledging that I am a 
prisoner, and asking to be free, my liberty is virtually 
in my own hands. Such a condition is no barrier to 
the soul that wants to be free. 

Yet confession as a condition of forgiveness must 
mean genuine, hearty confession, not the empty name 
of it, or the unmeaning form, but the genuine article. 
The confession which God requires must be something 



80 The Condition of Forgiveness. 

different from the thoughtless, formal acknowledgment 
of imperfection, which feels no personal responsibility 
and guiltiness. There is a kind of confession which in 
a general way identifies its offerer with the human 
family, as not being indeed yet what it ought to be, 
liable to slip, to err, to do wrong, but in a state of pro- 
gress, and which represents his faults as more owing to 
the conditions of his being than to any downright individ- 
ual depravity. This kind of confession simply makes a 
man class himself with others, and generally enables him 
to concludewith the Pharisaic congratulation that he is 
higher in the scale than the majority. There is another 
kind of confession which separates the heart from the 
life, and though it may condemn the one, justifies and 
praises the other, as if they might cancel each other, or 
leave something on the credit side of the account. On 
the other hand, it has been said, " A man will confess sins 
in general, but those sins which he would not have his 
neighbor know for his right hand, which bow him down 
in shame like a wind-stricken bulrush, those he passes 
over in his prayer. Men are willing to be thought sin- 
ful in disposition, but in special acts they are disposed to 
praise themselves. They therefore confess their de- 
pravity, and defend their conduct. They are wrong in 
general, but right in particular." Indeed, confession is 
so varied a thing that Mr. Spurgeon once preached a 
sermon upon the text, "I have sinned," as used by 



The Condition of Forgiveness. 8 1 

Pharaoh, Balaam, Saul, Achan, Judas, Job, and the 
Prodigal, and illustrating seven different kinds of con- 
fession. But there can be but one kind of confession 
that is genuine and acceptable to God. It is the con- 
fession which is born of genuine penitence, which is 
truthful and frank and thorough, which is not weakened 
and vitiated by self-justification, which does not say, 
Yes, I have done wrong, but — somebody tempted me, 
but — the circumstances were against me, but — others 
have done worse, but — it was the result of inherited 
propensity, but — it was not so very wrong after all. 
Sincere confession confesses its sin in a clean, full, 
humble, manly way, with a deep consciousness of the 
greatness of its sin, and an earnest determination, by 
the help of God, to be delivered from its hateful and 
damning power. It feels to the very centre of its being 
the sin which it confesses, as David felt it when he said, 
" I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is ever 
before me," — as the prodigal felt it when he said, " I 
will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, 
Father, I have sinned against heaven and before thee, 
and am no more worthy to be called thy son," — and 
as the publican felt it when he cried out in the agony 
of his prayer and in deep humility of soul, " God be 
merciful to me the sinner." 

It is said of John Bradford that " when he was con- 
fessing sin he would never give over confessing till he 



82 The Condition of Forgiveness. 

felt some brokenness of heart for that sin ; and that 
when praying for any spiritual mercy, he would never 
give over the suit until he had got some relish for that 
mercy." It is to be feared that there is much so-called 
confession which is unreal and unblessed, which does 
not go deep enough, which has little realizing sense of 
the enormity of the sin which it confesses, as some- 
thing which God hates with the whole force of his holy 
nature, as the thing which crucified the Son of God 
upon the shameful cross of Calvary, and which, if not 
repented of, will destroy both soul and body in hell. 
We need to offer again and again the old prayer — 

" Lord, when we bend before thy throne, 

And our confessions pour, 
Teach us to feel the sins we own, 

And hate what we deplore." 

I have said that the Scriptures teach us that confes- 
sion is the condition of forgiveness and salvation. 
They teach it everywhere, not to the exclusion of faith 
in Christ, nor as a substitute for it, for repentance and 
faith are inseparable. I now add, this condition is no 
arbitrary requirement. In the very nature of things 
there can be no genuine forgiveness unless there is 
genuine confession. We may overlook a wrong done 
us, but we cannot forgive it until it is repented of and 
confessed. Forgiveness is the feeling which responds 



The Condition of Forgiveness. 83 

to confession. Nothing else can call it forth in the 
heart of man or of God. He who fails to confess his 
sin fully, frankly, and honestly, can have no peace of 
mind, or self respect, but he carries about with him the 
deep consciousness of his wrong doing and a stinging 
conscience. Hidden sin brings hidden sorrow. Sin 
unconfessed shuts out the joy of pardon. Sin truly 
confessed is sin forgiven and sin blotted out. 




XIV. THE HOMESICK GERMAN. 



XIV. 
THE HOMESICK GERMAN. 

There is a wonderful power in the recital of Chris- 
tian experience. Paul believed it, and the story of his 
conversion was a mighty weapon in his hand, which he 
wielded for the glory of God. The most successful 
Christian workers I have known, both men and women, 
have been those who knew how to tell modestly, ten- 
derly, and effectively what the grace of God had done 
for them. Could the experiences which are told in our 
churches by those who apply for membership be written 
and published, what an interesting library would they 
make, and what a convincing argument would they be 
in favor of the truth and power of our gospel ! How 
alike and yet unlike, agreeing so exactly in their vital 
points, and yet differing so beautifully and wonderfully 
in their details ! Does God keep a record of the work- 
ings of his grace, and will the remembrance and recital 
of Christian experience have anything to do with the 
happiness of heaven ? Who can tell ? 

I am prompted to put on record a part of the story 
told by a humble German, who recently applied for 
membership in a Baptist church. It will be only 
a part of the story, for for three-quarters of an 
hour he poured out his heart in a way that alternately 



86 The Homesick German. 

brought tears to the eyes and smiles to the faces of 
those who heard him, and made the older Christians 
confess that old-fashioned conversions are not alto- 
gether things of the past. The story as written will 
lack too, I fear, much of the interest which the teller's 
broken English and peculiar forms of expression gave 
to it. 

Mr. B , when quite a young man (in i860, I 

think), determined to leave his native land and come 
to America, whither his brother and many friends and 
neighbors had already gone. His father at first was 
strongly opposed to his leaving home, but at length, 
seeing that his son was fully determined, he gave his 
consent, and the young man embarked in a sailing vessel, 
with a company of four hundred, bound for New York. 
He had, of course, been brought up in the faith of the 
State church,' which is satisfied with obedience to 
certain rites, and makes no demand for inward piety. 
He knew nothing of saving faith, and had never been 
brought in- contact with any better form of Christianity 
than that of his family. He had a restless, roving 
disposition, had roamed about his own country, dis- 
liked restraint, was fond of his liberty, and above all 
of the pleasures of the world. He had thrown his 
whole heart into the gayeties and frivolities of life, and 
had no higher or nobler purpose in living. 

When the ship was a few days out she encountered a 
terrific storm, which increased in intensity day after 



The Homesick German. 8/ 

day. The oldest sailors had seen nothing like it before, 
and yet, instead of coming to an end, it only grew 
worse. Fear was upon them all, and again and again 
the passengers were told that there was no hope, for 
no ship could outlive such a gale. As is usual in such 
circumstances, those who had forgotten God before 
were driven to pray to him for help in this extremity, 
and Valentine among the rest (for that was his given 
name) promised the Almighty, over and over again, that 
if he would spare his life to reach the port, he would 
consecrate it to his holy service. In the meantime, so 
long time had elapsed since the sailing of the vessel 
that she had been given up as lost, and her passengers 
were mourned as dead. At length, after a passage of 
fifty-eight days, her arrival was announced at New 
York, and hundreds of people gathered at the wharf, 
with great rejoicing, to welcome their friends as from a 
watery grave. 

Amid the festivities that followed, Valentine forgot 
the solemn vow which he had made unto God in trouble, 
and after some months he found himself at work among 
his own people in western Pennsylvania. But God did 
not forget him. He followed him by his Spirit, ever 
reminding him by a voice which he could not silence, 
of the promise which he had made, and calling for its 
fulfilment. Whether he was at work or seeking worldly 
pleasures, alone or in company, by day and by night, 
the call kept coming to him, giving him no rest and no 



The Homesick German. 



comfort. Month after month passed away, but he told 
no one of [he great secret trouble that was gnawing at 
his heart. His appetite left him, the color faded from 
his cheek, and the joy from his eye, and he seemed fast 
losing strength and vitality. At first his friends ban- 
tered him, saying he was homesick and longed for his 
fatherland. But soon, when they saw how pale and 
feeble he was becoming, their banter changed to pity, 
and they said he must go home or he will die. But 
still he kept his heavy secret, only replying that he had 
no means and could not return. At length a ticket was 
procured for him and put in his hands, and he con- 
sented to return to Germany, fixing the time when he 
would go to New York to set sail, for he was ashamed 
to tell the cause of his inward trouble, and his heart 
was still unwilling to yield itself to God. 

It was the last evening before his departure. He had 
been to say good-by to his friends, and returned at ten 
o'clock to his chamber. The next morning he was to 
take the early train, and he knew that instead of leaving 
behind him his heavy, troubled heart, he would take it 
with him. He took up a neglected Bible and turned its 
leaves. They seemed to contain nothing but con- 
demnation for him. In a moment of -almost frenzy he 
threw it from him into the corner of the room, deter- 
mined never to touch it again, for, as he said, he would 
not have a Bible that only condemned him. But in an 



The Homesick German. 



instant he realized what he had done, his will was 
broken, he burst into tears, he flew to the corner of 
the room, reaching it, as he said, almost as soon as the 
Bible, picked up the precious volume, carried it back 
to the light, and then as he opened it, how changed ! 
// C07itained nothing bid promises. He bowed on his 
knees in remembrance of his solemn vow, and there 
penitently, gratefully, lovingly, he gave himself, a new 
creature, to Christ his Saviour. He hardly knew what 
the new experience meant, for he was utterly a stranger 
to such things, and lived among a people who were 
strangers to them. But into his soul, that had so long 
been dark and troubled, there came a light and peace 
such as it had never known. In the morning he was 
on hand at the appointed time for the early breakfast, 
but the color of health had begun to reappear, and his 
face was radiant with the joy that filled his heart. The 
family saw the change, and rejoiced in it, ascribing it, 
however, to the flight of the homesickness in anticipa- 
tion of his speedy return to his native land. Then he 
sat down and told to their bewildered ears the story of 
his long and persistent resistance of God's call, and 
the wonderful grace that had come to him, and as- 
tonished them the more by saying, " I shall not take 
the train to New York this morning. I shall surrender 
my ticket to Germany, for I prefer to remain in a land 
where. I have found Christ precious to me, and I shall 



9° The Homesick German. 

not be troubled with homesickness any more, for my 
poor soul has found its home." 

Amid much opposition and persecution from friends, 
he united with a Methodist church, which was the only 
church near him that could sympathize with his spiritual 
change. After seventeen years of labor in that fellow- 
ship, during which there had been a deepening convic- 
tion in his mind that he had not rendered obedience to 
the positive command of Christ to be baptized, he with 
his wife, who had been led to the same conviction, have 
now together made happy profession of their faith in 
the buried and risen Lord, and confess to a sense of 
completeness which they had never felt before. 




XV. THE LOST JESUS. 



XV. 
THE LOST JESUS. 

We can well believe Mary when she said to the child 
Jesus, whom she found in the temple after that three 
days' absence, " Behold, thy father and I have sought 
thee sorrowing," or, as it might be rendered, we have 
been searching for thee in great distress. Their love 
for him was the love of parents for their children, 
deepened, it may be, a thousand-fold by the tender 
mystery that was about his birth, and the singular 
purity, beauty and loveliness of his character. They 
must have loved with a peculiar affection a child who 
had been committed to their care so strangely, about 
whom were gathered such sacred hopes, and who was 
in himself so pre-eminently lovely. As year by year 
they had watched him developing in all sweetness of 
disposition and obedience of conduct, not so much 
instructed by them as their instructor, and shedding 
the light of his holy life in all their home, how their 
hearts must have been drawn out to him, until he had 
become the one object for which they lived, the joy of 
their joys, the hope of their hopes, the centre around 
which all life moved to them ! 

And this year they had taken him, a bright lad of 
twelve years, up to the great festival of their people. 



9 2 The Lost Jesus. 



The joys of the festival are over, and their faces are 
turned toward their Galilean home. But " the child 
Jesus tarried behind in Jerusalem." The parents, all 
unconscious of his absence, went on without him. In 
the words of Canon Farrar — "A day elapsed before 
the parents discovered their loss ; this they would not 
do until they arrived at the place of evening rendezvous, 
and all day long they would be free from all anxiety, 
supposing that the boy was with some other group of 
friends or relatives in that long caravan. But when 
evening came, and diligent inquiries led to no trace of 
him, they would learn the bitter fact that he was alto- 
gether missing from the band of returning pilgrims. 
The next day, in alarm and anguish — perhaps, too, 
with some sense of self-reproach that they had not 
been more faithful to their sacred charge — they retraced 
their steps to Jerusalem. The country was in a wild 
and unsettled state. The ethnarch Archelaus, after ten 
years of cruel and disgraceful reign, had recently been 
deposed by the Emperor, and banished to Vienne, in 
Gaul. The Romans had annexed the province over 
which he had ruled, and the introduction of their 
system of taxation by Coponius, the first procurator, 
had kindled the revolt which, under Judas of Gamala 
and the Pharisee Sadoc, wrapped the whole country in 
a storm of sword and flame. This disturbed state of 
the political horizon would not only render their 



The Lost Jesus. 93 



journey more difficult when they had left the shelter of 
the caravan, but would also intensify their dread lest, 
among all the wild elements of warring nationalities, 
which, at such a moment, were assembled about the 
walls of Jerusalem, their son should have met with 
harm. Truly, on that day of misery and dread, must 
the sword have pierced through the virgin mother's 
heart ! " 

The city was reached in safety, but alas ! the object 
of their search was not yet found. Their minds were 
well nigh distracted by painful fears and wild imagin- 
ings. Every hour added terror to the suspense. It 
was not until the third day that the lost boy was re- 
covered, and their distress at last relieved. Then it 
was that Mary, over-joyed, and it may be, not a little 
troubled that Jesus should have willingly occasioned 
them so much alarm, said to him in language of 
mingled love and chiding, " Son, why hast thou thus 
dealt with us ? Behold, thy father and I have sought 
thee sorrowing." 

Have you ever lost a child, who had wandered from 
home, when you supposed him to be playing safely in 
the garden under the window ; or who had been sep- 
arated from you in the crowded thoroughfare, when 
you thought him nigh at your side ? The moment you 
became conscious of your loss, your heart trembled 
within you ; you called loudly again and again the dear 



94 The Lost Jesus. 



name, but no answer came back ; you inquired frantic- 
ally of every passer-by if he had seen a lost child ; you 
thought quickly what might have happened — injured 
by some accident, crushed by some heavy carriage, 
stolen by some human fiend, crying and sobbing with 
strangers, and longing for mamma and home. Have 
you ever passed through such an experience ? It may 
have been only for an hour, it may have been only for 
a few moments. You were incapable of being pacified ; 
your heart was breaking for only one comfort, the sight 
of that dear face again. If you have known such an 
experience as that, then you know how to sympathize 
with Mary and Joseph, as they searched for two long 
nights and a day for their lost Jesus. 

Jesus, when he took upon himself our nature, became 
kin to us all. When he was born into the world, he 
was born not simply into the family of Mary and 
Joseph, but into your family and mine. He entered 
into relations with all the families of the children 
of men, that he might live in them as Son and Saviour, 
and shed among them the light of his infinite grace and 
redeeming love. Verily, he called himself the Son of 
man, as well as the Son of God. No family circle is 
complete without him. No home on earth is perfect if 
he is wanting in it. Joseph's family should not be the 
only one that is alarmed and anxious, when it is found 
that Christ is not there. Sad to say, he who came to 



The Lost Jesus. 95 



seek and to save that which was lost, may himself be 
lost sight of amid the world's throng and pleasures, 
cares and friendships, and he who came to bring the 
wanderers back to God and hope, may be compelled to 
be a wanderer from the homes, the hearts, and the love 
of men. Parents and children may be there, but if 
Christ is missing, the board is an empty board, and no 
warm, cheerful fires of eternal hope burn on the sombre 
hearth. Sad is the home, and sad should feel the 
home, which has in it no Christ. 

Is Jesus a lost Jesus to you, dear reader ? Have you 
never sought him and never found him ? You have 
begun your journey towards your long home. During 
the bright days of prosperity you may not miss the 
absent Christ, though there is no prosperity that is not 
brightened a hundred-fold by his divine presence. But 
when the night comes, the night of sorrow, of temp- 
tation, and of death, men wake up to the lonely reality, 
and despairingly cry, where, oh, where is Christ, the 
neglected, the lost Christ ? Christ is always needed. 
In no human heart, in no journey of life is there true 
and abiding joy until Christ is found. 

"Jesus, thou joy of loving hearts, 
Thou fount of life ! thou light of men ! 

From the best bliss that earth imparts, 
We turn unfilled to thee again. 



96 



The Lost Jesus. 



" Thy truth unchanged hath ever stood ; 

Thou savest those that on thee call ; 
To them that seek thee, thou art good, 

To them that find thee, All in All." 




XVI. MY FATHER'S BUSINESS. 



XVI. 



MY FATHER'S BUSINESS. 

These suggestive words were contained in the reply 
of the child Jesus to his mother, who gently chided him 
for his voluntary absence, when at the age of twelve he 
tarried in Jerusalem, and allowed the caravan, in which 
were Joseph and Mary, to go on without him. They 
set forth the reason of his conduct. It was not that 
he loved the earthly mother less, but the heavenly 
Father more. There was no loss of human affection, 
but the incoming of a stronger passion. It is not ne- 
cessary to suppose that there was on the part of Christ 
any waywardness, or disobedience, or even thoughtless- 
ness of a mother's anxiety and distress of heart. The 
seamless robe of his perfect life was not rent at this 
point. The spotless purity of his spirit suffered no 
stain. A new call, and that call from above, was begin- 
ning to sound in his ears. The meaning and object of 
his great mission were beginning to dawn upon his 
mind. We may say, perhaps, that, at this time, to the 
boy Jesus life took on a higher purpose, and its current 
flowed with a broader sweep. He had come up to 



98 My Father 's Business. 

Jerusalem, and mingled in its solemn worship, and 
looked upon its conflicting scenes, until his soul was 
deeply moved and his ear caught the divine summons. 

Mr. Thomas Hughes, in his little volume, " The 
Manliness of Christ," thus explains this incident in 
Christ's boyhood : " All that he heard and saw in the 
Holy City, among the crowds of worshippers, and 
the rabbis teaching in the temple courts — the first 
view of the holy hill of Sion, the joy of the whole 
earth — the strange contrast of the eager traffic, the 
gross Mammon worship, the huge slaughtering of 
beasts, with all the brutal accompaniments, with that 
universal longing and expectation in those multitudes 
for the Messiah, who should lead and work out the 
final deliverance and triumph of the people of God in 
that generation, must have stirred new questionings 
within him, questionings whether that voice which he 
had been already hearing in his own heart was not only 
a call, such as might come to any Hebrew boy, but the 
call — whether among all that vast assembly he was 
not the one upon whom the supreme task must be laid, 
who must be the deliverer of his people, so certainly 
and eagerly looked for. To the young spirit before 
whose inward eye such a vision is opening, all human 
ties would shrink back, and be for the moment forgot 
ten. And when recalled suddenly by the words of his 
mother, the half-conscious, dreamy answer, * How is it 



My Father s Business. 99 

that ye sought me ? Wist ye not that I must be in my 
Father's courts, about his business ? ' loses all its appa- 
rent wilfulness and abruptness." 

In this experience of Christ's boyhood, then, we find 
a waking up to a fuller consciousness of the great mis- 
sion which he came upon earth to fulfil. "My Fath- 
er's business S " This was his motto and his inspira- 
tion. Not yet had the time come for him to sunder all 
human ties. He must still go back to the Galilean 
home and be subject to his parents. But when he em- 
barked upon his public ministry, to be misunderstood 
and rejected by men and forsaken even by his breth- 
ren, when he confronted the cross of death, which he 
must first bear before it bore him, he knew no other 
motive and felt no higher impulse than this, " My 
Father's business." ■ 

There are times in the lives of men to-day when they 
feel the incoming and resistless influence of a mightier 
motive, when a stronger passion takes possession and 
control of them than the strong passion of human affec- 
tion, not supplanting it, but holding it in abeyance, 
until it has accomplished its purpose for evil or for 



How sometimes an evil passion or appetite, like the 
appetite for strong drink, gets the mastery of the soul, 
and rising above not only self-respect and love of vir- 
tue, but even love of home, of parents, of wife, of chil- 



100 My Father s Business. 

clren, launches one, no, not one, but thousands and tens 
of thousands, forth upon the wild and deadly sea of 
dissipation, and they are found at last, not in the holy 
temple of God, but in that horrible temple of Satan, 
where character, hope, happiness and human souls are 
the smoking sacrifices ! 

On the other hand, see how sometimes love of coun- 
try proves stronger than love of family and home, and 
leads one forth in the hour of the nation's peril, even 
to the surrender of life, that honor and liberty may be 
preserved in the land. The natural affections are not 
weakened ; they even grow stronger under the strain that 
is put upon them ; but another principle, another pas- 
sion has come in to guide and determine the conduct. 

Or, take a still higher illustration, where a servant of 
Christ, out of love to Christ and perishing heathen, 
turns his back upon home and native land, its loved 
ones, its friendships, its joys, its advantages, and puts 
oceans between them and him, and spends his life sur- 
rounded by darkness, discomfort, loneliness, peril, dis- 
gusting superstition and savage barbarism. There is 
no insensibility of heart ; there is no weakening or 
paralysis of natural ties ; they never bind so tightly as 
when the moment of separation comes ; yet go he 
must, for a divine passion, the spirit of Christ's love 
and self-surrender which brought him down to earth, 



My Father s Business. IOI 



has taken possession of his servant, and at his Master's 
bidding he leaves all and follows him. 

And, indeed, something of this kind occurs at every 
genuine conversion to Christ. A new passion comes 
into the soul, be it in manhood or in boyhood. A 
strong and controlling principle begins to work. The 
love of Jesus is shed abroad in the heart, which, while 
it does not destroy any natural affection, rises superior 
to them all. This is what Christ meant when he said : 
" He that loveth father or mother more than me is not 
worthy of me, and he that loveth son or daughter more 
than me is not worthy of me " — not that filial or pa- 
rental affection is wrong, but right, and ordained by 
God himself; but that into these loving hearts of ours 
a new love enters, which may indeed add new strength 
and beauty to all natural affections, and at the same 
time be the supreme and dominant passion of the soul. 

Christ was not forgetful of Joseph and Mary; his 
love was stronger and tenderer than human sen ever 
felt; yet he must be about his Father's business. 
Mary's heart was pierced with anxious sorrow when she 
thought she had lost her boy, as they journeyed home- 
ward. Her soul was pierced with still deeper anguish 
when she saw her son, now grown to manhood, hang- 
ing upon the cross of shame and suffering. Yet Jesus 
was not forgetful or unloving. He could even so far 
forget his own agony, in that final hour, as to make 



102 jtfy Fathers Business. 



provision for his mother's future comfort. But — he 
must be about his Father's business. Just so when the 
strong love of Christ comes into the heart, then friend 
says to friend, companion to companion, child to parent, 
Do not think me less loving and true ; by the grace of 
God - 1 hope to be more loving and more true ; but I 
must follow Christ, I must obey the divine, call, I must 
be about my Father's business. It is not that I love 
you less, but that I love Jesus more. The new love 
rises above all other loves, and becomes the master 
passion of the soul, constraining its possessor to say to 
the world and its allurements, to selfishness and its 
indulgences, to sin and its servants, " How is it that 
ye seek me ? Wist ye not that I must be about my 
Father's business ? * <* 

It should be added that the life which has not felt 
the thrill of this divine call, and yielded to its high 
behest, is still a selfish, worldly, unspiritual life. It is 
not lived according to the eternal principles of right 
and duty. It is not lived for heavenly and enduring 
rewards. It is not lived in obedience to the Lord Jesus 
Christ. Oh, listen to the divine call to-day, and obey 
the heavenly prompting, that life may be filled with a 
holy purpose, and take on grander proportions and an 
upward look. You may be still in the morning of life. 
Jesus was but a lad of twelve years. Or you may have 
advanced to manhood and maturity. But whatever 



My Father s Business, 103 



your age or condition, you are God's creature, created 
in his image, subject to his supreme authority and ac- 
countable to him. The path of obedience may seem 
steep and difficult ; yet it is the only path to peace and 
glory. For no life is blessed, no life is satisfactory, no 
life is truly honorable, no life has the promise of the 
hereafter, unless it is moved, controlled and lived on 
this principle — / must be about my Father's business. 




XVII. JUSTICE AND MERCY. 



XVII. 
JUSTICE AND MERCY. 

The apostle John states first the condition and then 
the ground of the divine forgiveness in these words : 
" If we confess our sins, he is faithfuld and just (or 
righteous, as the Revision has it) to forgive us our 
sins." I think many persons are suprised at the read- 
ing of the second clause of this verse. It certainly 
reads differently from what they would expect. Any 
one would naturally suppose that the verse would be 
completed in a way something like this : If we confess 
ours sins, he is merciful and gracious to forgive us our 
sins, or words to that effect. We ordinarily ascribe 
our salvation to the divine attribute of love, to the 
infinite mercy of God. And, indeed, this is right, for 
the Psalmist said, " Thou hast not dealt with us after 
our sins, nor rewarded us according to our ini- 
quities ; " that is, God has not dealt with us as we 
justly deserved. Again, he said, " If thou, Lord, 
shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand?" 



104 y us tic e and Mercy. 

In other words, let strict justice have its course, and 
not one person of the whole human family could have 
a ray of hope. 

Yet John tells us, " If we confess our sins, he is 
faithful and just to forgive us our sins." What can it 
mean ? For this language certainly declares to us that 
the forgiveness of the sinner, on the condition here 
laid down, grounds itself in the fidelity and justice of 
God ; so that the salvation of the truly penitent man 
rests not only upon the mercy, but upon the righteous- 
ness of the Almighty ; in other words, upon the whole 
nature of God. 

I think we shall be able to understand the meaning 
cf these words of John, if we stop a moment and in- 
quire, to what is God faithful, and to whom is he just, 
when he forgives the penitent ? These questions bring 
us face to face with the great plan of redemption, that 
wonderful exhibition of divine mercy and righteous- 
ness, in which God has given to men his promise, and 
entered into solemn covenant with them in his Son 
Jesus Christ. So that now, if we truly confess our 
sins, we are told that God will be faithful to his 
promise, he will be just to his own crucified Son. 
Outside of Christ, God's justice would only condemn 
us ; but in Christ that attribute as well as his mercy is 
pledged to our forgivness ; so that on the fidelity and 
justice of God rests the hope of our salvation. 



Justice and Mercy. 105 

Paul in his letter to the Romans speaks of the pur- 
pose of Christ's work as being that God might be just 
and the justifier of him who believeth in Jesus ; but 
John goes farther, and says not only that God is just 
when he justifies the penitent believer, but that he 
would not be just, if he did not forgive and justify him; 
in other words (I say it reverently), he would be un- 
faithful to the promise which he has made, he would be 
untrue to his own solemn covenant, he would be false 
to his crucified Son. 

We need not fear, then, if we are truly penitent for 
our sins and long for God's pardon, what his justice 
may do unto us. It is our truest friend, and is actively 
enlisted in our service. The justice which once Con- 
demned us, now secures for us forgiveness and salvation. 
This is the assurance of our hope and the ground of 
our confidence. He has promised, and he will fulfil it. 
" He abide th faithful, he cannot deny himself." The 
scheme of our redemption which infinite wisdom 
devised and infinite love executed, infinite justice will 
stand by to the end. Dr. Guthrie beautifully says : 
11 Like two streams which unite their separate waters to 
form a common river, justice and mercy are combined 
in the work of redemption. Like the two cherubim 
whose wings met above the ark ; like the two devout 
and holy men who drew the nails from Christ's body, 
and bore it to the grave ; like the two angels who re- 



1 06 Justice and Mercy. 

ceived it in charge, and seated like mourners within the 
sepulchre — the one at the head, the other at the feet 
— kept silent watch over the precious treasure ; justice 
and mercy are associated with the work of Christ. 
They are the supporters of the shield on which the 
cross is emblazoned ; they sustain the arms of our 
heavenly Advocate ; they form the two solid and eternal 
pillars of the Mediator's throne. On Calvary mercy 
and truth meet together, righteousness and peace em- 
brace each other." 




XVIII. ONE LESSON OF PENTECOST. 



xvnr. 
ONE LESSON OF PENTECOST. 

There is no more interesting, instructive and encour- 
aging study for the Christian Church than the scenes 
connected with its origin and early growth. In those 
scenes, the record of which has been left for us by no 
ordinary historian, we find some of the most delightful 
encouragements for our Christian faith, and some of 
the most important lessons to guide us in our service 
in Christ's kingdom. If Pentecost, that glorious out- 
burst of divine power upon a community that seemed 
well nigh dead and immovable, was to characterize the 
Spirit's dispensation which it ushered in, was typical 
and prophetic of what we are to expect all down the 
Christian centuries, then we can not be too familiar 
with that early revival, with all its lessons as well as 
its blessed scenes and results, and our every contem- 
plation of it may kindle within us new, and deeper, and 
more earnest longings for its fresh repetition, and give 
to us a better spiritual preparation for its coming. 

It may be asked, do you not think that Pentecost was 
an extraordinary event, brought about at that time in 
the Church's history for a peculiar purpose, and that 



108 One Lesson of Pentecost, 

therefore it hardly furnishes a safe guide for subsequent 
expectations ? It was certainly an extraordinary event, 
and in some of its features it was unique and forever 
to remain unparalleled. The sound from heaven as of 
a rushing mighty wind, the flames of fire, the gift of 
tongues, those external, miraculous evidences of the 
presence of the Spirit, may not be again expected. 
But in its spiritual significance and its general objects, 
as well as in the human conditions which preceded it, 
Pentecost has found a successor in every revival that 
has since occurred in the world, and gathered scores or 
hundreds, or thousands into the churches of Christ ; 
and it will be looked upon to the end of time as a true 
guide and instructor by those who are longing and 
praying for the conversion of men and for the full 
coming of the Redeemer's kingdom. 

The purpose of Pentecost may now be seen in the 
light of the effects which it produced. It was to be a 
fresh, divine seal of Christianity, a powerful and con- 
vincing proof of its heavenly character and origin. If 
there ever was a time when Christianity needed such a 
proof and attestation of its claims, it was then. The 
few weak disciples of Christ were passing through dark 
days, which had lengthened into weeks of humiliation 
and trial. Fifty days before, their Master had been 
crucified. His enemies had put an end to him, and 



One Lesson of Pentecost. 109 

the spear that pierced the side of the dying man upon 
the cross was supposed to have pricked his foolish and 
blasphemous pretensions, and to have quieted forever 
the little excitement which he had made. To be sure, 
in three days after his burial, Christ rose from the dead, 
and ten days before Pentecost he had ascended into 
heaven. But the people knew nothing of this, or if 
they had heard it, they did not believe it. To them 
Christ was dead and buried. His brief career had 
come to a sudden and shameful end. His claims were 
now shown to be utterly absurd, and all his boastings 
foolishness. The -conclusion had proved that he was 
at least deluded, if not an impostor, as many were in- 
clined to think. In their judgment the disciples of 
Christ had pinned their faith to the dictum of a poor, 
weak, dead man, and being drawn to him by a strange 
fascination, had committed their all to him and had 
lost it, being now the laughing-stock of all the commu- 
nity. If men had ever been disposed to believe in this 
professed King and Saviour, they had so such disposi- 
tion now. After his ignominious failure and the burst- 
ing of all his grand schemes, nothing could be farther 
from their thoughts than faith in him. Christ, his pro- 
fessions, his kingdom, his religion, had like the foolish 
man's house of which he spoke, all been built upon the 
sand, and had been swept away and gone to pieces. 



no One Lesson of Pentecost. 

What could re-establish his kingdom, prove the verac- 
ity of his claims, and give him now a hold upon the 
incredulous minds of men ? What could prove the 
living power,, the Messiahship, the rightful Sovereignty 
and Kingship of this man, whom they had seen cruci- 
fied and put to* death ? Nothing, but the unmistakable 
seal and endorsement of heaven, as seen in the signs, 
wonders and glorious results, of Pentecost. And these 
did it. The dead man was proved to be true Prophet 
and living King. His truth, which they had crushed 
to earth, reappeared clothed with immortal strength. 
His kingdom which they had puffed away with angry 
breath, began to rise a real and substantial thing 
among them. It was as if a new voice from heaven 
spake unto them, saying, " This is my beloved Son, in 
whom I am well pleased," so that all the house of Israel 
might know assuredly that God had made that same 
Jesus, whom they had crucified, both Lord and Christ. 
To our eyes, I say, it seems not only desirable but ab- 
solutely necessary that the effect of the humiliation and 
apparent failure at the crucifixion should be overcome 
by this marvellous display of power and grace before 
all the people, and that the honor of Christ, whom they 
had mocked and put to shame, should be signally vin- 
dicated in the eyes of all. 

Such is always one purpose in revivals of religion. 



One Lesson of Pentecost. m 

They are God's repeated endorsement of the divine 
nature of Christianity, and set a new seal upon its 
claims. They lift the name of Christ out of the dust 
in which it may have been dragged, and exalt it, and 
make it glorious. They are the very best reply that can 
be made to materialists. They are an unanswerable 
argument against atheists and skeptics. They put the 
crown anew upon the brow of Christ in the presence of 
his maligners and persecutors. When" the Church seems 
to be under a cloud by reason of the tierce assaults of 
its enemies or the shameful defection of its professed 
friends, a revival scatters the darkness, and reveals the 
face of its divine King, and delivers it out of all its 
troubles. A revival is the panacea for all our spiritual 
ills, aud raises once more into the clear heavens the 
name of the crucified Another has said, " The quiet 
conversion of one sinner after another, under the ordi- 
nary ministry of the gospel, must always be regarded 
with feelings of satisfaction and gratitude by the minis- 
ters and disciples of Christ; but a periodical manifest- 
ation of the simultaneous conversion of thousands is 
also to be desired, because of its adaptation to afford 
a visible and impressive demonstration that God has 
made that same Jesus who was rejected and crucified, 
both Lord and Christ, and that, in virtue of his divine 
mediatorship, he has assumed the royal sceptre of uni- 



112 One Lesson of Pentecost. 

versal supremacy, and must reign till all his enemies be 
made his footstool. It is therefore reasonable to expect 
that from time to time he will repeat that, which, on the 
day of Pentecost formed the conclusive and crowning 
evidence of his Messiahship and Sovereignty." 




XIX. HOLINESS, NOT HAPPINESS. 



XIX. 
HOLINESS, NOT HAPPINESS. 

What is the true aim of life and the great end of 
religion ? I answer, personal holiiiess — a truth which 
needs to be emphasized to-day, when so many persons 
look upon religion as a matter of the emotions, make 
the feelings the test of piety, and think the Christian 
life consists in being happy rather than in being holy, 
in " feeling good " rather than in living righteously. 

If we examine the Word of God, which is of course 
our great religious directory, and explains to us the 
nature and divine purpose of revealed religion, we 
shall find that it bears uniform and unvarying testi- 
mony on this point. The gospel is called " the way of 
holiness." Believers in Christ are said to be " elected 
to holiness " "new created in holiness," and to "have 
their fruit unto holiness." They are commanded to 
"yield their members as instruments of holiness," to 
"present their bodies to God in holiness," to have 
"their conversation in holiness," and to seek "per- 
fection in holiness." And at last, it is said, they shall 
be " presented to God in holiness," for " without holi- 
ness no man shall see God." The name of Jesus, 
given to him by God ante-natally, reveals the one great, 



H4 Holiness, not Happiness. 

significant purpose of his birth, his life, his death, his 
whole work and mission on earth. " Thou shalt call 
his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their 
sins," and so it is written, " The blood of Jesus Christ 
cleanses us from all sin." 

Whether, therefore, we look at the divine thought in 
the manifestation of Christ among men, or at the pre- 
cepts and commandments enjoined 'upon those who 
became his disciples, we find that they all point in one 
direction and towards one worthy and sublime end, 
viz. : holiness of character, purity of heart, perfection 
of life and being ; in a word, conformity to the image 
of Christ. To present the inspired testimony on this 
point would be to rehearse, in great part, the entire 
utterance and teaching of the word of God. It offers 
no conflicting testimony. It gives no uncertain sound. 
The one great, clearly-defined purpose of the gospej is 
to make men holy. Christ came to save men from their 
sins. 

Or if we look at the life of Christ, who is acknowl- 
edged to be, in the spirit which animated him, and in 
the ends for which he lived, the one authoritative ex- 
ample for us all, what do we find ? Whoever gets the 
impression from the study of his life that he was seek- 
ing his own comfort or happiness ; that he performed a 
single act or lived a single day with a simple reference 
to the gratification of his own desire, regardless of that 



Holiness, not Happiness, 115 

holy divine will which he acknowledged to be the 
supreme law of his life, or that he, in any sense, con- 
sulted his own present joy in the labors and activities 
which crowded his brief earthly existence ? Is not his 
life always represented as a life of obedience, of holy 
devotion and unquestioning loyalty to the will of 
another in spite of all painful consequences, of 
thoughtful, self-forgetting service for that humanity 
whose sins and woes he took upon himself, of willing 
self-surrender even unto the shame and agony of the 
crucifixion ? Did he not say in explanation of the 
purpose of his earthly mission and of the motives 
which guided and determined all his life, " I came not 
to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me? " 
— not that there was any conflict between the will of 
the Father and the will of the Son, for they were one 
in heart, in purpose, and in being; but here in his 
earthly manifestation the place of the Son was that of 
entire subordination, and the spirit which he was to 
illustrate for us all, was the spirit of unqualified and 
unquestioning obedience. 

And so, from the beginning of his life, when at the 
age of twelve years the divine call came to him, and 
there dawned upon his expanding mind the vision of his , 
life-work, and he said to his human parents, " Wist ye 
not that I must be about my Father's business," until the 
final struggle and passion and tragedy, when he cried, 



1 1 6 Holiness, not Happiness. 

" Nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt," the life 
of Christ was never a seeking after happiness or a pur- 
suit of comfort, but always, first and foremost, a life of 
obedience, an illustration of holiness, an exemplifica- 
tion of unswerving righteousness. He might be " de- 
spised and rejected of men ; " he might be called " a 
man of sorrows and acquainted with grief ; f> that was 
of little moment. But no man must be able to con- 
vince him of sin ; the robe of his perfect righteousness 
must be without rent or seam. 

Or look, once more, at the moral nature of man, and 
the fundamental place which that nature holds in our 
being. We are more than creatures of sensibilities, to 
be moved to joy or sorrow, to smiles or tears, whose 
highest glory consists in being happy, who are capable 
of that and nothing more. There is a deeper and 
more essential element in our manhood. We are 
created in the moral likeness of God, a likeness which, 
though marred and defaced by sin, is nevertheless the 
supreme characteristic of our being, and its recovery 
and restoration must be the great end of religion, the 
sublime goal of life. It is but a meagre and trivial 
description of man to say he is a creature who is 
capable of happiness and of sorrow, of pleasure and 
of pain. In that he may differ little from the rest of 
the animal creation. It is not that which distinguishes 
him, though his joy may be sweeter and his pain may 



Holiness, not Happiness. 117 

be keener than that of other animals. It is a higher 
and more accurate definition of man to say that he is a 
creature endowed with moral nature and perceptions, 
and capable of doing right, of loving truth and duty, 
and of obeying his conscience and his God. Sensibili- 
ties ! They are but the surface of our nature, while 
underneath is the great bulk and volume of intellectual 
and moral being. What difference does it make 
whether the sunbeams dance upon the river's surface 
or the wild winds ruffle it, if only the whole current of 
our being is onward, irresistibly onward towards God 
and holiness ? " As he which hath called you is holy, 
so be ye holy in all manner of conversation ; " that is, 
in the entire spirit and conduct of your life. 




XX. WHY BECOME CHRISTIANS? 



XX. 
WHY BECOME CHRISTIANS? 

It being taken for granted, as it surely will b.e, that 
holiness, and not happiness, is the true aim of religion 
and end of life, ought not the basis of the frequent 
religious appeals which are made to men, to be changed 
and brought into harmony with this acknowledged 
principle ? Men are oftenest persuaded to become 
Christians because of the joy, the happiness which such 
a course will bring to them here and hereafter, in this 
world and the world to come. We emphasize the 
peace which comes to the forgiven soul, and lay great 
stress upon the joys of salvation, contrasting the joys 
of the Christian with the fading and unsatisfying joys 
which the world has to offer. All this is true. Your 
heart and mine, fellow Christian, know how true it is 
from their own blessed experience, and undoubtedly 
this aspect of the Christian life ought not to be over- 
looked. 

But is there not a higher, truer and (shall I not say 
it ?) manlier method of appeal and approach to men ? 
There is nothing that ought to touch and influence 
moral beings so much as moral reasons. Men ought 
to love God and acknowledge the claims of his Son 



120 Why Become Christians f 

Jesus Christ upon them, because it is right. Men ought 
to repent of their sins and seek the forgiveness of God, 
not simply because of the joy which it will bring to 
their souls, but because it is their immediate and un- 
questionable duty. Men ought to believe in Christ, 
and to begin and continue a life of cheerful obedience 
to Christ, because God commands it, and every want of 
their moral nature impels them to it. Love Christ, 
become Christians, not simply or principally that you 
may be happy, but that you may be holy, and that your 
whole moral and spiritual being may be quickened into 
a new life, and brought into harmony with the holy will 
of God. Children may be influenced by an appeal 
based upon an offered happiness, though even they are 
influenced by a sense of right, and duty, and moral 
obligation earlier than we are wont to think. But it 
seems extremely childish to make the being happy the 
strong motive for becoming Christians to intelligent 
moral beings, who, with all the force of their moral 
nature, ought to be seeking after God and holiness. 
Moreover, I say it deliberately, to put Chistianity in 
competition with the pleasures of the world is to de- 
grade Christianity. It has higher motives, and nobler 
and holier rewards. 

Here is the reason why some persons, who appear to 
begin the Christian life, soon lose their zeal and the 
warmth of their first love. They make the mistake of 



Why Become Christians? 121 

making happiness the end of religion. And when they 
find from actual experience that the old words which 
Christ spoke still hold true, " If any man will be my 
disciple, let him deny himself, and take up his cross 
and follow me," and, " If ye love me, keep my com- 
mandments," that there is the denying of self, the 
bearing of the cross, the doing of Christ's holy com- 
mandments, they experience a feeling of disappoint- 
ment, for they had started out with the idea that to be 
a Christian was not primarily to be holy, but to be 
happy ; and to most persons happiness consists in 
having their own way, in doing as they please, and not 
in pleasing another. It was a suggestive remark of a 
bright old lady, ninety-two years of age, to a visitor, 
that now that she was so old there was very little that 
she wanted — she only wanted to have her own way. 
But the Christian is to please not himself, but Christ, 
and to consult not his own comfort, but the will of his 
divine Master, not his own ease and preference, but 
right and duty ; and he finds that God's ways are not 
always the ways of his unsanctified heart. 

Who of us has not found sometimes that the path of 
duty lies right in the teeth of apparent comfort and 
happiness; that the personal wish must be repressed ; 
that the strong preference must be strangled ; that the 
trembling desire must be crucified ; that the warm 
affection must be torn limb from limb ; and that 



122 Why Become Christians? 

at the distinct call of God and of duty, the tenderest, 
strongest ties must be severed, and the soul go forth 
like the patriarch, not knowing whither it goes ? Oh, 
when will the Church of Christ learn that not man's 
will, but God's will, is to be done in and through every 
individual member ; or rather man's will, only as it is 
God's will ; that whom he did foreknow he also did 
predestinate, not to ease and comfort and the gratifica- 
tion of self, but to be conformed to the image of his 
obedient and self-denying Son, and that obedience is 
better than comfort, and holiness more to be desired 
than happiness ? And when will it go forth to the 
world, itself adorned with the beauty of holiness in all 
its parts, uttering in every man's ear the solemn 
trumpet-tone of its divine message : " The blood of 
Jesus Christ cleanses from all sin." "Be ye, therefore, 
holy, for God is holy." 

It should be added that while happiness pursued 
as an end vanishes away, holiness pursued as an end 
brings happiness to the soul at last as its inevitable 
accompaniment and the soul's everlasting possession. 



XXI. GOD'S DELAY. 



XXI. 
GOD'S DELAY. 

One reason for God's delay in the judgment of sin 
is, we are told, that he may give men an opportunity to 
repent and be saved — " not willing that any should 
perish, but that all should come to repentance." Men 
are forever misunderstanding the dealings of God with 
them. If God does not appear to take notice of their 
conduct and to visit them with speedy punishment for 
their sin, they infer that he is ignorant of it. " How 
doth God know, and is there knowledge with the Most 
High ? " Or, what is worse still, and farther from the 
truth, if possible, they infer that he approves their 
course. Because God seems to let them alone for a 
little while, or allows them to have a measure of pros- 
perity, they are wont to think themselves justified in 
his sight. 

But verily God does know, and verily God does con- 
demn. Sin can find no hiding-place from his all-pierc- 
ing eye. Up and down this world his glance flies, 
penetrating all the dark places of human life and 
character, making luminous the concealed corners 
were illicit deeds are done, and taking notice of the 
unexpressed thoughts of all hearts. It is said " Guard 



124 God's Delay. 



well thy thoughts, for thoughts are heard in heaven." 
Under such daily, hourly, momentary inspection every 
human being lives. We are apt to think only of man, 
and to order our conduct as in his sight, asking our- 
selves, will he discover it, will he find it out, and to 
forget that the great eye of God is following us in all 
our doings and thinkings, and that " all things are 
naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we 
have to do." If there is one thing that may well sit as 
sentinel over the affections of our hearts, the workings 
of our minds, the activities of our hands, the paths of 
our feet, it is the solemn thought, "Thou God seest 
me." 

But God does more than see. Wherever his eye 
rests, he finds something to condemn. There is no 
heart so pure that he does not see in it the defilement 
of sin. There is no character so fair that he does not 
detect in it many a flaw. There is no life so perfect 
and lovely that he does not say " one thing thou 
lackest." And this God, so far-seeing, so heart-search- 
ing, "is of purer eyes than to behold evil, and can not 
look on iniquity." 

If, therefore, God knows, and if he condemns, how 
can he spare ? Jesus, when he dwelt among men, left 
for them this beautiful and impressive parable : " A 
certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard ; and 



God's Delay. 125 



he came and sought fruit thereon and found none. 
Then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard, behold 
these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, 
and find none; cut it down, why cumbereth it the 
ground? And he answering said unto him, Lord", let it 
alone this year also, till I shall dig about it and dung 
it ; and if it bear fruit, well ; and if not, then after that, 
thou shalt cut it down." " If It bear fruit *' — if man 
repents, and brings forth fruit meet for repentance, 
" well- - " The lifted ax is stayed ; the condemned tree 
is spared ; another year is added to its existence ; its 
time of probation is lengthened. So I look upon 
every added year of life, every added month, every added 
week, every added Sabbath, as but another opportunity 
for the impenitent to repent and turn unto God. God 
withholds his judgment, he delays the coming of that 
fatal hour which will usher them into his presence, he 
wards off repeated dangers, he raises them up from 
sickness, he prolongs their days, " not willing that any 
should perish, but that all should come to repentance." 
It is said that Roman magistrates, when they gave 
sentence upon any one to be scourged, had a buudle of 
rods, tied hard with many knots, laid before them. The 
reason was this — that whilst the beadle or flagellator 
was untying the knots, which he was to do by order, 
and not in any sudden or hasty way, the magistrate 



126 God's Delay. 



might see the deportment of the criminal, whether he 
was sorry for his fault, and showed any hope of amend- 
ment, that then he might recall his sentence, or mitigate 
his punishment ; otherwise he was corrected so much 
the more severely. Thus God, the divine Magistrate, 
interposes delay after delay, and ties up the rods of 
his anger with many a hard knot, that men may have 
time to confess their sins, and look unto him for mercy 
and forgiveness. 




XXII. WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST? 



XXII. 
WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST? 

It has been said that " Christ is the touchstone of 
the human heart," the flinty jasper that determines the 
presence of any heavenly metal in the earthly alloy of 
human affection and desire and passion. He is the 
magnet that detects the presence or absence of the 
iron of a devout faith or a holy love in the sands of 
the soul's life. Would you know the disposition, the 
true, spiritual character of your own soul, or of any 
soul, apply Christ to it. The present condition, as 
well as the everlasting destiny of a man, is determined 
by his relation to the great Son of God. What think 
ye of Christ ? has been made the test question of 
human character and human hope. The treatment 
which men give to the only Saviour of the world, more 
than any thing else, reveals their true character and 
standing in the sight of God. 

You might apply this test to the theologies and relig- 
ious faiths of men. As they exalt or ignore God's Son, 
the once crucified and now risen Christ, so are they 
valuable or worthless for the production of genuine char- 
acter or for purposes of general salvation. How many 



128 What Think Ye of Christ f 

pretentious beliefs, advocated by men to-day, would be 
unable to bear the test, and would be found to be 
utterly empty of spiritual power and of substantial 
hope ! They have in them no room for the divine 
Christ and the uplifting and saving power of his 
cross. 

But it is with individual character and individual 
hope that I have to do at this time. This is the im- 
portant truth which I wish to set forth and emphasize 
— a man's relation to Jesus Christ determines his 
relation to God. 

I shall pass by the essential oneness of the Father 
and Son, and speak of Christ simply as the manifested 
Son of God. As men think of him, and treat him, and 
honor him, so is their attitude and disposition towards 
him that sent him. 

I am aware that some persons seem to think that 
they can ignore Christ, and neglect his claims, and dis- 
regard his person and work, and still be God's spiritual 
children, and their hearts be right in his sight. But 
let us see how impossible this is, and that really the 
offer of Christ to the soul is the unfailing test of its 
disposition towards God. 

You will remember that Christ said "I am the 
door," the door that God has opened into his presence, 
and into the possession of all spiritual safety and bless- 
ing, and that he solemnly averred that "no man cometh 



What Think Ye of Christ? 129 

unto the Father but by me." Now, if Christ is the 
dcor, the one door which God has provided of approach 
to himself, and of entrance into life, what possible hope- 
ful relation can we sustain to him, if we persistently 
despise the only entrance to his fellowship and regard ? 
If we expect to enjoy the hospitality of a home we must 
knock at the door, and make friends with the appointed 
door-keeper, especially if the door-keeper is the 
honored Son himself. 

But Christ said more than that. To those who 
claimed to be God's spiritual children, because of their 
natural descent from his servant, Abraham, Christ put 
this very simple and authoritative test : " If God were 
your Father, ye would love me." This shall be the 
test of all true spiritual relationship to God, that the 
heart is found drawn out in love to him whom God has 
sent to be our Saviour. Anybody can apply the test to 
his own heart. If a man wishes to know whether he 
is truly a child of God, and now shares in his paternal 
regard, and may hope for a share in the heavenly in- 
heritance, let him ask himself the question, " Do I love 
the Lord Jesus Christ, and instead of opposing and 
resisting his rightful authority over my soul, am I will- 
ing to render affectionate obedience to his command- 
ments ? " It is a very simple test-question, and as it 
is answered, Christ becomes the revealer of the actual 
disposition of the heart before God. How does a man 



130 What Think Ye of Christ? 

know that he is a child of God ? Because he loves 

Christ. 

But Christ said even more than that. On one occa- 
sion he said, " He that honoreth the Son, honoreth the 
Father ; " and on another occasion he declared the 
same truth in opposite language, " He that hateth me 
hateth my Father also." Love and hate are the two 
opposing passions of the soul, into which all its emotions 
may be resolved. And whichever passion a man feels 
towards Christ he also feels towards God. It is im- 
possible to love God without loving the manifested 
Son of God. And, on the other hand, it is impossible 
to be indifferent to the person and claims of Jesus 
Christ without showing unpardonable disrespect to 
him who sent him, and whose will he came on earth to 
accomplish. Aside from all essential unity between 
Father and Son, they are so one in spirit, so one in 
purpose, so one in moral attributes, so one in their love 
for a lost race, that they can not excite different emo- 
tions in the same heart. It will be either honor and 
love, or it will be indifference and hatred. The visible 
Christ becomes the unmistakable revealer of the soul's 
disposition towards the invisible Father. 

The authorized agent of a house represents the 
house in authority and dignity, and is to be treated as 
such. The honored son of a family carries with him 
all the family honor, and becomes its representative 



What Think Ye of Christ? 131 

wherever he is. The ambassador of a nation or the 
prince of a kingdom represents the name, the power, 
the dignity of the government or throne, and whatever 
is shown to him of respect and honor, or of neglect 
and insult, is shown to the government or throne -which 
is behind him, and which he represents. Christ was 
God's visible representative on earth ; he was Heaven's 
first citizen, aye, the Son and Prince of God's eternal 
kingdom, having all power in heaven and in earth, and 
the key of the government on his shoulders, and the des- 
tinies of men in his hands ; aye, he was " God manifest 
in the flesh," revealing to us through that fleshy veil, 
(which concealed, as well as revealed), the person, the 
will, the glory of Deity, showing to us more of God 
than man ever knew or could have known, and represen- 
ting in his person the dignity and glory of the throne of 
God; and so God says, as Christ is welcomed or rejec- 
ted, so am I ; as Christ is honored or dishonored, so 
am I ; as Christ is loved or despised, so am I. Your 
treatment of him will be your treatment of me ; 
and your disposition towards him will indicate your 
disposition towards me. 



XXIII. CHRIST THE REVEALER. 



XXIII. 
CHRIST THE REVEALER. 

The perfect teachings of Christ hold the mirror up 
to the hearts of men, and in this way their moral con- 
dition is revealed to them. We are not entirely depend- 
ent upon the teachings of Christ for our knowledge of 
moral duty. We all have conscience and moral sense, 
the faculty of distinguishing between right and wrong, 
and of discerning the moral virtues, such as honesty, 
industry, chastity, temperance. There is such a thing 
as natural morality, and a primary table of laws in the 
universal heart of man. As Paul said, when the heathen 
who have not the law, do by nature the things contain- 
ed in the law, they are a law unto themselves. This we 
all admit. And I think we are quite ready to admit, 
also, that however imperfect this code of morals may 
be, it is not kept by any man. Every conscience is 
an accusing conscience. No man lives up to its teach- 
ings. 

But when Christ came, the divine Teacher, he out- 
stripped all other teachers of morals. He imparted 
fresh life to conscience itself. He gave new force and 
beauty and comprehensiveness to moral law. Our Sa- 
viour, he who came to redeem us and whom we are to 
acknowledge as Lord, as Master, began his work of 



134 Christ The Revealer. 

redemption by exalting the standard of morals which 
men had permitted to drop so low, and by widening the 
sphere of morals until it embraced all conduct and life. 
Every act became a moral act. And his teachings not 
only applied to the outward act, but to the inner motive 
as well. He took a lighted candle and went down into 
the dark, subterranean passages of the soul, and brought 
the very thoughts to judgment. Hatred was murder ; 
and under his teaching, lust was adultery. Whoever 
taught it before ? How the great moral virtues were 
not overlooked, nor set aside or made light of, as some 
men seem to think, but emphasized, exalted, glorified, 
as he discoursed upon them, until men saw themselves 
in a new light, and found their judgment of themselves 
fast changing ? Until at length, as with the authority 
of the Author of all law, he gathered it up and con- 
densed it into two pregnant utterances : " Thou shalt 
love the Lord thy God with all thy might, mind and 
strength," and "thy neighbor as thyself." Well did 
he say, " If I had not come and spoken unto them, 
they had not had sin ; but now they have no cloak for 
their sin." So great was the contrast that before he 
opened his lips to teach, men had little consciousness 
of their sins, but now, in the light that shone from his 
words, there was nothing that could hide their sins. 

What a mirror is the sermon on the mount, polished 
to a heavenly brightness, and how it discloses, to the 



Christ The Revealcr, 



35 



candid eyes that look into it, the moral deformity of 
heart and life, the utter incompleteness of all human 
righteousness, and the needs of every soul ? Surely, 
here the thoughts of many hearts have been revealed. 
Is it possible that some men have never stood face to 
face with their own image in this divine mirror, and so 
have no correct impression of their moral self, or, hav- 
ing once looked into it, have since carefully refrained 
from repeating the act, and have forgotten what man- 
ner of persons they are ? 

Again, not only do we see in the mirror of Christ's 
perfect teachings the reflection of our true selves, but 
the perfect life of Christ is the one example for all 
men, and when we honestly compare ourselves with that, 
we are still more certain to have a revelation of our 
guilt and shortcomings. 

Christ not only taught us how to live, but he lived 
it. His life was the perfect illustration of his doctrine. 
He was himself incarnate truthfulness, incarnate obedi- 
ence to every holy commandment, incarnate purity, in- 
carnate meekness, incarnate love. He walked in daily 
and hourly communion with God. He was holy, harm- 
less, undefiled, and separate from sinners and their 
sins, in the sense of having no fellowship with the one 
and no indulgence in the other. Did he live right ? 
Did he live as every one of us ought to live ? Has 
he walked with his sinless feet the one perfect path 



136 Christ TJie Revealer. 

which we all ought to follow? Has he set the one 
perfect example for the race ? You all say "yes " to 
these questions. 

Then tell me, please, why men are forever comparing 
themselves with one another instead of with Christ, and 
finding in the weakness of human examples the justifi- 
cation of their own weakness. Why do they not com- 
pare themselves and their life with Christ and his life? 
What possible good can any other comparison do them ? 

And tell me, please, why, if Christ is the one exam- 
ple for us all, men are forever setting up two standards 
of morality and life, one for others and another for 
themselves, one for the priests and another for the 
laity, one for the ministers and another for the peo- 
ple ? Pray tell me, on what principle men demand that 
a minister shall live a more holy, a more consistent, a 
purer life, and one freer from sin and sinful indulgences 
than the life which they demand of themselves, and 
that the associations of a minister's home shall be more 
spiritual and not so worldly and sinful as the associa- 
tions which they allow in their own homes. Is there 
such a thing as an official sanctity, or an official moral- 
ity, which pertains to a man because of his office ? Are 
we not all to be kings and priests unto God, ministers 
at the sacred altar of home ? Are we not all to be per- 
fect as God is perfect, as Christ is perfect ? I claim 
the right, as a minister of Christ, to do in the realm of 



Christ The Revealer. 137 

morals whatever it is right for my people to do ; or, to 
put it better, I claim that God does not require of me a 
more holy life than he requires of all my people. He 
requires that you should be perfectly holy, and surely 
he can not require me to be any thing more. To put 
your minister in your place, or better still, to put Christ 
in your place, may be a quick method of determining 
the right or wrong, the morality or immorality of any 
course of action. The time has gone by, if it ever was, 
when the clergyman was regarded as the only one who 
was bound to illustrate the purity, the spirituality, the 
moral beauty of the gospel of Christ. 

Oh, if Christ be the one example for us all, let us 
cease having a double standard of living and choosing 
the lower one for ourselves, and let us cease comparing 
ourselves with one another, for purposes of self-justifi- 
cation or self-condemnation. 

Am I like Christ? is the one question fox us all. 
We may sing, 

" I love to kiss each print where thorn 
Hast set thine unseen feet;" 

but how often do we put our feet in the prints of his 
feet, and walk the path he trod of holiness and of life ! 
When we think of the moral beauty and harmony, the 
symmetry, the completeness, the absolute perfection of 
his life, how imperfect and unworthy and sinful are the 
best lives which we see among men ? 



138 Christ The Revealer. 

I acknowledge that there have been noble illustra- 
tions of personal piety, those who seemed to walk 
with God from day to day, whose spirits were filled 
with a heavenly sweetness, and whose lives were bright 
with a heavenly light, and we have wished we might be 
like them. But Jesus, our only model, is so far above 
us and them, that the greatness of his moral stature 
does but impress us with the littleness of our own, and 
the resplendent beauty of his life does but reveal the 
blemishes and deformity of ours. Who of us can look 
at the portrait of Jesus, as it is drawn by the pen of 
Matthew or Mark or Luke or John, so full of grace and 
truth, and not be compelled to confess what a contrast 
between that and this ! how unlike, how unlike I am to 
Jesus ! And so Jesus becomes the revealer of human 
hearts, and in contrast with his perfect righteousness 
we are made to see our unrighteousness. 

But to what end ? Why is Christ the revealer of 
human hearts ? We acknowledge that we are not like 
the model which God has given us, that we are not what 
we ought to be. What step shall we take next ? 
" Him hath God exalted with his right hand to be a 
Prince and a Saviour, for to give repentance to Israel 
and forgiveness of sins." " If we confess our sins he 
is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse 
us from all unrighteousness." Is it wise for us to fol- 
low God's directions ? The revelation of one's self is 



Christ The Revealer. 139 

but the first step in God's plan of salvation. It is to 
be followed by sincere repentance, a humble faith in 
Christ, and an entrance upon the new life. Do you not 
recognize these as the well-known landmarks of this old 
gospel of the grace of God ? First and foremost, the 
knowledge of yourself, the deep consciousness of your 
soul's need. Se.cond, godly sorrow for sin. Third, the 
personal acceptance of our Almighty Saviour. And 
fourth, the beginning of that new life which shall end 
both in his presence and in his likeness. 

The blind man, conscious of his distressing need, as 
he heard the footsteps of the passing Jesus, cried with 
a loud voice, " Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy 
on me." And when they sought to make him hold his 
peace, he having some faint conception of the blessing 
he might gain or lose, cried so much the more, saying, 
"Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy on me." His 
prayer was heard, and into his sightless eyeballs there 
dawned the light of a new life and a new world. May 
we all, conscious of our spiritual need and blindness, 
cry aloud to the passing Christ, that in the light which 
he shall give, there may be revealed to us the depths 
of our sinning hearts and the heights of his saving 
mercy, the thoughts of God's heart, as well as the 
thoughts of our hearts, for Christ is the divinely ap- 
pointed revealer of both. 



XXIV. THE RELIGION OF THE FUTURE, 
PART I. 



XXIV. 
THE RELIGION OF THE FUTURE. 

PART I. 

Very much is said at the present time about the reli- 
gion of the future and the church of the future. Some 
men, thinking that they see indications that the prevail- 
ing faith in Christianity is going to pieces, and that the 
present system of things is about to undergo some great 
change or upheaval, are seriously inquiring what will be 
the nature of the coming faith and the character of the 
coming religion. Into their little balance they put 
Romanism, with its hoary superstitions, and Protestant- 
ism, with its numerous sects, and find them both want- 
ing. In their judgment, indeed, Christianity, which has 
served the world for so many centuries and has pro- 
duced such glorious results, is quite outgrown, and must 
give way before the new faith which is advancing so 
rapidly upon us. As Judaism was superseded by 
Christianity, so Christianity, they tell us, is to be super- 
seded by — something else. And this something else, 
these prophets do not hesitate to say, will be the joint 
product of science and reason. They do not define it 
very minutely, and are not altogether agreed in their 
descriptions of it. But on these two points there seems 



142 The Religion of the Future, Part I. 

to be harmony of opinion — the new religion will be 
scientific, and it will be reasonable. It will exclude 
everything supernatural, for that is unscientific and of 
the nature of superstition. It will contain no Saviour 
and no atonement, for none are needed. Its two great 
principles will be — faith in the laws of nature, and 
faith in man. On these two principles it expects to 
work out the problem of human destiny and the salva- 
tion of the soul. 

The thought I wish to suggest is this, that notwith- 
standing the confident assertions of these would-be 
prophets as to the speedy overthrow of Christianity 
and the introduction of a new religion, the religion of 
the future, the church of the future, will be founded 
upon the word of God, and not upon the discoveries of 
science or the utterances of human reason. The future 
religion, the future faith will be identical with a spirit- 
ual and biblical Christianity. It will not contravene 
the facts of established science ; it will not contradict 
the teachings of enlightened reason and conscience ; 
but it will rest solidly upon the revealed truth of the 
sacred Scriptures. 

For, in the first place, Christianity claims to be a 
final revelation and the final religion. No one can 
read its sacred records without being convinced that 
while there was much that went before it and pre- 



The Religion of the Future, Part I. 143 

pared the way for it, there is nothing that is to come 
after it and supersede it. 

Look at its plain assertions as to its permanence and 
perpetuity. Christ himself said, " For verily I say unto 
you, till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle 
shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled." 
And again he said : " Heaven and earth shall pass 
away, but my words shall not pass away." In the judg- 
ment of Christ the revealed will of God, as contained 
in his word, the system of religion which he came to 
proclaim, the words which he spoke, were final, endur- 
ing, eternal. They had in them the seeds of immortal- 
ity ; the power of an endless life. They should not 
pass away. The whole visible order of things in the 
material universe should pass away, but they should 
remain. These are but samples of the many assertions 
in the New Testament as to the permanence and un- 
changeableness of the religion of Christ. Christ never 
and nowhere intimated that the Christian system should 
be outgrown or set aside, or that it was preparatory for 
anything but heaven itself. And so Peter, speaking of 
the word of God, said, " which liveth and abideth for- 
ever,"- and contrasted it with the transient nature of 
man himself and everything human. " For all flesh is 
as grass and all the glory of man as the flower of 
grass. The grass withereth and the flower thereof fall- 



144 The Religion of the Future, Part I. 

eth away" (men, nations, and generations disappear 
and come to an end), " but the word of the Lord en- 
dureth forever. And this is the word which by the 
gospel is preached unto you." In other words, the lives 
of men, the opinions and earth-born faiths of men, are 
transient and of short duration ; but the religion of 
Christ, this gospel of our Christian faith, " liveth and 
abideth forever." 

Look, again, at the exclusiveness of Christianity. It 
does not allow for an instant that anything can arise to 
take its place, or that anything can be superior, or that 
anything else can be a gospel of salvation for the soul. 
We live in a time when men are engaged in the study 
of comparative religion, rinding points of agreement 
and disagreement between the religions which have 
dominated different nations and different ages. This 
is an exceedingly fascinating study ; but when it makes 
men eclectics in religion, finding good in all religions 
and acknowledging the superiority of none, its influence 
is pernicious and deadly. For Christ said not to his 
own time merely, but to all ages and the men of all 
ages, " I am the way, the truth, and the life ; " and 
again, " He that entereth not by the door into the 
sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is 
a thief and a robber," — language which strongly and 
positively forbids us to think that Christ allowed any 



The Religion of the Future, Part I. 145 

rival saviour or any rival salvation, and which declares 
as distinctly as language can declare it, that there is 
not now and cannot be in the future any other religion 
which contains a trustworthy promise of eternal life. 

The apostles so understood it. Peter said, " Neither 
is their salvation in any other ; for there is none other 
name under heaven given among men whereby we must 
be saved." Paul declared with a boldness which star- 
tles the uncertain, compromising spirit of our day, 
" For though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any 
other gospel unto you than that which we have preached 
unto you, let him be accursed." Enlightened by God's 
Spirit as to the saving truth of the gospel, Paul could 
not swerve from it a hair's breadth or make the slight- 
est concession to error or superstition, however plausi- 
ble or hoary. This, he said, is the gospel of the Son 
of God, and though an angel's lips should attempt to 
substitute for it something else, let him be anathema. 
The world need expect no other gospel than that which 
he preached, and he who undertook to preach any other, 
need expect only God's judgments. And the loving 
apostle John was no less severe against those who 
might attempt to set aside, modify, or improve this per- 
fect, everlasting gospel. " If any man shall add unto 
these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that 
are written in this book. And if any man shall take 



146 The Religion of the Future, Part I. 

away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God 
shall take away his part out of the book of life." 
These words undoubtedly refer primarily to the book of 
Revelation, but by a perfectly legitimate inference they 
apply to the whole gospel. Christ's gospel makes no 
provision for a successor, and leaves no room for the 
introduction of another. It says, I am God's word of 
life ; I am God's method of salvation for lost men ; I 
am the gospel, and there is, and there can be, no other. 
Look, too, at the foretold increase and universal tri- 
umph of Christianity. Christ's disciples were com- 
manded to go into all the world and preach the gospel 
to every creature ; not this gospel for a time and then 
something else ; not this gospel to a part of the world 
and something different to die rest, but this gospel to 
every creature. This is the one message which is to be 
preached everywhere and in all ages of the world. 
Have men already a religion? Preach to them this. 
Are they savage or civilized ? Preach to them this. 
Do they think that it did well enough for a past age, 
but that this age has outgrown it ? Preach to them this 
same old gospel. " Into all the world." " To every 
creature." And what are we told shall be the result of 
this world-wide preaching ? Listen. " Every knee shall 
bow," not to the revelations of science, and not to any 
idol philosophy which the most enlightened human rea- 



The Religion of the Future, Part I. 147 

son may set up, but "at the name of Jesus every knee 
shall bow and every tongue confess that he is Lord, to 
the glory of God the Father." The religion that is to 
be preached to all men, and is to command the rever- 
ence of all men, introducing no other, yielding to no 
other, and superseded by no other, is, we are told, the 
religion of Jesus Christ. This is its claim and its 
prophecy, and we may calmly believe it and act upon 
it, and not be troubled by the feeble utterances of self- 
constituted prophets who think themselves wiser than 
the Son of God. 




XXV. THE RELIGION OF THE FUTURE, 
PART II. 



XXV. 

THE RELIGION OF THE FUTURE. 

PART II. 

The previous paper presented the claim of Christi- 
anity to be the permanent and final religion. There 
are undoubtedly some persons who do not acknowledge 
the force of such a claim made by the Christian reli- 
gion in its own behalf. It may therefore be said, in 
the second place, in proof of the permanence of the 
religion of Christ, that it is evermore adapted to the 
unchanging nature of man, his constitution, his moral 
condition and needs. 

One of the most unchanging things in this world is 
human nature. You may look at it in different lands 
and times, under many complexions and under many 
skies, and you will find the most striking proofs of its 
identity. The external circumstances maybe different; 
there may be more or less culture, more or less wealth, 
more or less refinement and civilization ; but within is 
the same heart, stirred by like passions, influenced by 
like temptations, touched by like joys and sorrows, im- 
pelled by like motives and desires, and hopes, filled 
with common needs which only God can supply — the 
same sinning, loving, sorrowing, heaven-desiring, im- 



150 The Religion of the Future, Part II. 

mortal spirit within us all. Men may live before the 
blessed coming of Christ or after ; they may dwell 
under American or European, African or Asiatic skies ; 
they may be born at the dawn, or the noonday, or the 
sunset of the world; they may be clothed in purple 
and a palace be their home, or they may lie, like 
Lazarus, a beggar at the palace gate — they bear the 
marks of a common lineage and a common brotherhood. 
" God hath made of one blood all nations of men for to 
dwell on all the face of the earth." To this same un- 
changed and unchanging nature which is the common 
possession of us all, the religion of Jesus Christ comes 
with its wonderful, its divine, its saving adaptation. The 
same bread feeds us, and the same bread of life. The 
same water refreshes us, and the same water of salvation. 
The same air sustains us, and the same enveloping 
and inflowing grace and favor of God. Man cannot 
outgrow the bread which satisfies his. hunger or the 
water which quenches his thrist. Man cannot outgrow 
the atmosphere which fills his lungs and purifies his 
blood. No more can he outgrow the need of the hope- 
inspiring and life-giving faith of the gospel. Man can 
never outgrow Christianity, because with his unchang- 
ing nature he can never outgrow the need of Christ. 

Just see how wonderfully adapted the religion of 
Christ is to the nature and needs of man. It quickens 
and expands his intellect , it touches and purifies his 



The Religio7i of the Future, Part II. 151 

affections; it enlightens and strengthens his conscience; 
it renews his spirit and conforms his will to the divine ; 
it subdues his passions ; it controls his desires ; it en- 
riches and elevates his thoughts ; it secures his pardon ; 
it reconciles him to God and gives him peace ; it com- 
forts him in sorrow and strengthens him in temptation ; 
it helps him to bear life's burdens and to fulfil life's 
mission ; it fits him for this world and for the next ; it 
makes him unselfish, generous, forgiving, loving, pure, 
Christ like ; it lights up his home with a heavenly 
brightness, and cheers his pathway with a blessed 
hope ; it makes the end of life the beginning of glory, 
and opens for him the very gates of heaven and the 
golden streets of immortality. No antidote was ever 
more successful in overcoming poison than Christianity 
in overcoming sin. No medicine was ever more power- 
ful in healing the body than the religion of Christ in 
healing the soul. No key ever fitted its lock more 
beautifully than this gospel-key when applied to the 
nature of man. 

A Chinese student, himself a teacher among his 
pagan countrymen, was received by the missionary, 
Bishop Boone, into his family, to assist him in the 
translation of the Scriptures into the Chinese language. 
For a long time he was unaffected by what he read, 
except by its literary beauty. At length one day he 
rose suddenly from his work with the New Testament 



152 The Religion of the Future, Part II. 

in his hand, as if some great discovery had burst upon 
his mind, and exclaimed, " Whoever made this book 
made me. It knows all the thoughts of my heart. It 
tells me what none but a God can know about me. 
Whoever made me made that book." The key had 
found its lock and the lock its key. 

So long, therefore, as God's word remains un- 
changed, and human nature remains unchanged, the 
religion, the faith, and the church of the future will 
be the religion, the faith, and the church of Jesus 
Christ. Man needs and man will need no other religion 
than this. This meets his every spiritual want. Christ 
in the soul, and it is full. Christ in the life, and it is 
glorified. Christ in the man, and he is complete. 

Let no man waste a single hour in conjecturing what 
will be the religion of the future, or in devising some 
new form of faith. Let us rather use what we have, 
that which by the gospel is preached unto us. It is 
good enough. It is just what we need, and it is all we 
need. It comes to us with divine authority and absolute 
certainty. Man wants more than conjectures and 
guesses, if he would have peace and life. Mr. Froude 
says " We cannot live on probabilities. The faith in 
which we can live bravely and die in peace, must be a 
certainty, so far as it professes to be a faith at all, or it 
is nothing." The faith of the gospel is faith in that 



The Religion of the Future^ Part IL 153 

word "which endureth forever." It puts rock under 
the sinking feet. It puts peace and hope into the peni- 
tent spirit. It puts purity and the fountain of life into 
the trusting heart. It puts gladness and righteousness 
into this sad, weak life of ours. It puts a crown of 
glory on the throbbing brow, and everlasting praises on 
the lips redeemed. 

No man need fear for the progress and permanence 
of Christianity. It has been, is, and shall be till the 
end of the world, " the wisdom and the power of God 
unto salvation to every one that believeth." While 
God's word is true, while man is man, and his nature is, 
weak, sinful, human, while the world stands and time 
endures, this blessed gospel is to be preached, and men 
are to be saved by it. 

Only fear lest any of you should neglect this great 
salvation or should accept in its place some miserable 
and powerless substitute, and build upon the yielding 
sand the structure of your immortal hopes, the house 
of the imperishable soul. Or fear lest having accepted 
this divine gospel, this priceless expression of God's 
love, this final and only hope of a perishing world, it 
may fail to bring forth the expected and abundant 
fruits of righteousness in every life and heart. This is 
evermore the good seed of the kingdom. Let it fall 



1 54 The Religion of the Future, Part IL 

into your own hearts. Scatter it in the hearts of 
others. 

" All this world is God's own field, 
Fruit unto his praise to yield ; 
Wheat and tares therein are sown, 
Unto joy and sorrow grown ; 
Ripening with a wondrous power, 
Till the final harvest hour ; v 
Grant, O Lord of Life, that we 
Holy grain and pure may be." 




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